STATE SANCTIONED: Health care providers have to prove to the state that they need more of something, like hospital beds, before purchasing them. The request process often takes about six months.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Virginia’s romance with government regulation may not be doing much good in the realm of health care, but lawmakers don’t seem too eager to change the status quo.

Virginia is one of 36 states with certificate of need laws, requiring health-care providers who want to expand their business or buy more equipment get state approval first. If, say, a hospital wants any of 19 services — such as MRI scanners or hospital beds — it has to make a successful case to the state that it really needs them.

“CON programs, they’re not about public health or safety,” said Mercatus’ Christopher Koopman, who co-authored the research along with Thomas Stratmann. “They’re about limiting the supply of health care. And they’re doing so with some clear justification in that it’s somehow going to reduce the cost or increase the accessibility of health care for people. However, the evidence is pretty clear neither of those are being achieved.”

Koopman and Stratmann estimated Virginia’s Certificate of Public Need Program could translate to 10,800 fewer hospital beds than it might have otherwise, since states with CON programs have about half as many beds per 100,000 people as non-CON states. Researchers found a similar disparity in the number of MRI scanners between states with and without certificate of need laws.

The federal government forced states to set up CON programs in 1978, with the intent of limiting the supply of health care to make sure hospitals didn’t overinvest, while also requiring hospitals to care for the poor. In exchange, the feds provided money. But by 1987, even the federal government realized the laws were ineffective, repealing the federal mandate and cutting off funding to states.

In fact, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice concluded CON laws actually force prices upward, because they slow down competition in the health-care market.

Still, Virginia and 35 other states have kept their laws on the books.

Peter Boswell, director of the Virginia Certificate of Public Need Program, said the requirements made more sense financially when the federal government poured money in the program. Now, the fiscal argument isn’t as strong.

The state considers hospitals to be at capacity when 80 percent of beds are occupied, Boswell said. In 2012, the most recently available data, the highest occupancy of any Virginia hospital was Sentara Princess Anne Hospital in Virginia Beach — 88 percent capacity.

“So that raises the question, why do they need 10,000 more beds?” Boswell said.

Boswell doesn’t think hospitals would spend money wildly on equipment they don’t need, even if Virginia didn’t have CON requirements.

Gov. Terry McAuliffe and U.S. Sen. Mark Warner were elected with less than 50 percent of the vote in the past two years. This year, Joe Morrissey, the infamous state delegate convicted of indecency with a minor, regained his seat without a majority, too.

If Virginia had maintained its long-held system for runoff elections, it’s entirely plausible none of the three would be in office today. Runoffs between the top two vote-getters prevents candidates from triangulating their way to victory with mere pluralities.

Democrats McAuliffe and Warner clearly benefited from the presence of Libertarian Robert Sarvis in their contests. Morrissey, a Democrat-turned-“independent,” squeaked to victory with just enough Democrat votes.

State Sen. Bill Carrico, R-Galax, tried to curb this circus with SB 742 by requiring runoffs in any statewide election where the victor failed to win a majority.

Carrico’s bill passed the closely divided Senate on a party-line vote. But in one of the more inexplicable casualties of the 2015 General Assembly, SB 742 never got to the floor of the House, where Republicans hold a super majority.

Perhaps the House Appropriations Committee, where Carrico’s bill died, was concerned with the price. Runoffs “greatly add to the cost of elections,” says Bill Thomas, an electoral board worker in Richmond.

“Our current annual budget is over $1 million,” he notes.

Yet much poorer states — including Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi — manage to afford runoff elections. And despite Democrats’ fears, the results are not rigged for conservatives.

Yes, Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu lost in a runoff after winning a plurality in the general election last fall. But tea partyer Chris McDaniel lost to moderate Republican Sen. Thad Cochran in a runoff in Mississippi. Cochran prevailed on the strength of African-American votes.

Sarvis says he prefers runoffs to the “status quo” in Virginia. Ideally, he and state Libertarian Party Chairman Bill Redpath would opt for “Instant Runoff Voting.”

Instant Runoff Voting is a bit byzantine. Votes are first distributed by first choices. If no candidate has more than half of those votes, then the candidate with the fewest first choices is eliminated. Voters who selected the defeated candidate as a first choice then have their votes added to the totals of their next choice. This process continues until a candidate has more than half of the active votes or only two candidates remain. The candidate with a majority among the active candidates is declared the winner.

An old-style runoff may not help third-party candidates who struggle to reach double digits at the polls, but it is far easier to grasp than the Survivor-like machinations of an “instant runoff,” which isn’t necessarily so “instant.”

But municipalities from coast to coast, including Chicago right now, regularly conduct runoff elections. Even Yankees see the value in true majorities. If no one gets over 50 percent in Vermont’s gubernatorial races, the Legislature chooses, Kondik points out.

Surely, the land of Washington and Jefferson, who generally disdained political parties, can appreciate the inherent advantages of majority rule by the public.

“Without a majority, we have a governor who speaks on behalf of his state, but not even a majority of her voters,” observes Shak Hill, who ran for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate last year.

For those who maintain that primary elections are more “democratic” than party conventions, recall that Ed Gillespie, the man who bested Hill, was required to win an outright majority at the GOP convention to secure the party’s nomination.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

A BLOW TO COAL: The Virginia Senate cleared the way for the EPA to impose stricter carbon-emission rules on the state.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. – Bowing to the Environmental Protection Agency, the state Senate reversed course and killed a bill that would have required General Assembly review of stricter carbon emission rules.

The defeat of Senate Bill 1365 in the waning hours of the 2015 legislative session will result in a “backdoor rate increase” for Virginia electric consumers, predicted Randy Randol, an energy consultant.

In an ironic twist, retiring state Sen. John Watkins, R-Midlothian, voted against his own proposal Friday. The 29-7 vote to strike SB 1365 from the calendar was a further erosion of state’s rights and a victory for the Obama administration’s ongoing war on coal.

After numerous revisions and dilutions – ping-ponged back and forth between the House and Senate — Watkins’ bill lost some of its teeth.

Initially, any carbon-emission proposals by Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s Department of Environmental Quality would have to pass muster with the Republican-controlled General Assembly before they could be submitted to Washington.

The House passed the measure, 64-30. But Watkins and his colleagues weakened the bill along the way.

“You might as well call it the McAuliffe-Watkins bill,” Randol told Watchdog.org.

After a majority of Senate Republicans voted to kill SB 1365, Randol said a coalition of tea partyers and consumer activists would try to revive the idea next year.

Changing political calculus could work in their favor. Besides Watkins, fellow Republican Sens. Jeff McWaters and Walter Stosch – both of whom voted to strike SB 1365 from the calendar – are retiring this fall.

CONTRACT TRANSPARENCY: A bill going to Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s desk would require the governor and attorney general to turn over contracts with outside legal counsel.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Taxpayers might get to find out why the executive branch is letting outside legal firms bill the state up to $720 an hour.

If Gov. Terry McAuliffe signs a bill likely headed to his desk, anytime Attorney General Mark Herring’s office hires outside counsel to represent a state agency, the OAG will have to put that contract online for the world to see.

It’s a move that would add transparency for taxpayers who might want to know why their hard-earned dollars are going towards $720-an-hour attorney fees to represent the Virginia Retirement System, or how the state spent $16 million on outside counsel in fiscal year 2013.

State Sen. Mark Obenshain, R-Harrisonburg, who narrowly lost the race for attorney general to now-Attorney General Mark Herring, is pushing for the OAG to post all special counsel contracts online, and state in writing why hiring outside help is cost effective and in the public’s best interest.

Virginia law allows the attorney general to use outside counsel when “it is impracticable or uneconomical for the attorney general’s office to render such a service.” But the attorney general doesn’t have to offer case-by-case details as to why that is.

Hiring outside firms that specialize in areas the attorney general’s legal team doesn’t is a common practice, and the OAG already submits an annual report to the General Assembly on how much outside counsel billed the state to represent its agencies. The way it generally works, outside law firms offer bids for their services to the state, creating a slate of pre-approved firms from which the executive branch can pick.

The national push towards more transparency in outside legal contracts, supported by groups like the American Tort Reform Association, is supposed to protect taxpayers from lawyers who might leverage the state to collect a paycheck. In December, the New York Times published a three-part series detailing a troubling trend in which lawyers persuade attorneys general to let them represent the state as a plaintiff. Sometimes, the New York Times detailed, those cases bear little interest to the state.

It’s transparency that might have proved useful to the public, for instance, in the summer of 2013, when the administration of former Gov. Bob McDonnell all but shut down media requests for details on the governor’s legal representation related to the Jonnie Williams scandal. At the time, redacted invoices obtained through the Virginia Freedom of Information Act didn’t really say what legal services taxpayers were funding for tens of thousands of dollars.

– This post was updated at 3:04 p.m. to include information from Michael Kelly, Herring’s director of communications.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

FORMULA FAILURE: Auditors dinged the Virginia Department of Health for not submitting $5.1 million in infant formula rebates and Medicaid claims.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. – The Virginia Department of Health may be the most wasteful and inefficient agency in state government, a new audit suggests.

The department was cited for “material weaknesses” in five areas by the state’s Auditor of Public Accounts. No other state agency was found to have more than one material weakness — the most serious financial category in the fiscal 2014 report.

Auditors dinged VDH for not submitting $5.1 million in infant formula rebates and Medicaid claims, even though the department has rebate contracts through the Women Infants and Children feeding program.

“The income from these contracts is used to offset food expenditures incurred by the program,” the auditors said. “By not submitting the invoices for rebates and Medicaid claims, the WIC program required more federal funds for operation than necessary.”

Health Department officials agreed with the findings and reported the issue “is now corrected.”

“The unbilled portions have been recovered, resulting in no permanent financial loss to either the state or its federal grantor,” noted Lilian Peake, director of the Office of Family Health Services.

Officials said they will require less federal funding going forward.

A second material weakness also involved the WIC program. Auditors found that VDH failed to track all WIC disbursements made through electronic benefit transfers (EBT).

The department admits it is not now investigating $92,000 in transactions that were never matched with “valid benefit issuances.”

“Health is still paying the EBT vendor for these transactions,” auditors noted.

Auditors recommended a series of corrective actions to the system that launched last year, and VDH management concurred.

Peake told Watchdog that VDH worked with vendors to reconcile its outlays. She said the contract with the EBT processor will be modified to include an independent review of the reconciliation process that occurs at the point of sale.

Maribeth Brewster, a manager at VDH, said two other material weaknesses identified by the audit involved programs only peripherally associated with the department.

“VDH concurs with auditor’s findings and is implementing the report’s recommendations,” Brewster said.

The one-year state audit spanned the administrations of Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell and Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe. VDH is headed by Bill Hazel, who was initially appointed by McDonnell.

RICHMOND, Va. — Plying a third path to what could be another presidential run, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry is blasting Democrats and Republicans alike over Washington’s dithering on border security.

“It’s a bipartisan failure. Congress has done nothing while people die,” Perry told a GOP gathering in Richmond on Tuesday night.

The once and possibly future presidential hopeful was applauded repeatedly for his call to “secure the border.” The tough talk distanced him from the moderate pronouncements of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, prospective rivals in 2016.

Perry, who deployed the Texas National Guard during last summer’s surge of children across the Rio Grande, did not prescribe a fix for America’s illegal-immigration problem. But he maintains President Obama is not up to the challenge.

“He turned me down,” Perry said of the president’s response to his invitation to join him at the Mexican border. “He made it abundantly clear he was not going to take action.”

Spoken like a native son of the Republic of Texas that he is, Perry declared to cheers at Virginia Republicans’ annual Commonwealth Dinner: “If Washington isn’t going to secure the border, Texas will.”

Steve Farnsworth, political science professor at the University of Mary Washington, and Geoffrey Skelley, analyst at the University of Virginia Center for Politics, agreed that illegal immigration is a hot button for conservatives and could play well for Perry.

“No one knows the issue better than Perry,” Farnsworth said.

But Skelley noted one of the reasons Perry “flamed out” in the 2012 GOP primaries was his decision to grant in-state tuition to illegals in Texas.

“He really wants to run for president again; I’m just not sure he’ll have any success. There are a lot of younger and more interesting candidates this time around. The space doesn’t seem to be there for him.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

DAY LABOR: Illegal and unlicensed laborers compete for construction jobs at the expense of U.S. workers. The Pew Hispanic Center estimates that up to 40 percent of brick masons and drywall installers are undocumented.

Spotty oversight of construction trades enables unlicensed subcontractors to exploit the cheap labor of illegal immigrants and undercut law-abiding builders, taking jobs from U.S. citizens. The results range from shoddy work to lost tax revenue.

Eric Olson, executive director of the Virginia Board for Contractors, acknowledged in an email “there is no statutory requirement” for state and local licensing agencies to share information or coordinate enforcement efforts.

Olson said this week that illegal and unlicensed subcontractors have been the subject of 599 disciplinary cases since 2003.

Contractors interviewed for this article say 599 is a drop in the bucket. Indeed, more than 200 violations were found in the Lynchburg area alone.

Outcomes range from warnings to license revocation. Fines up to $2,500 are commonly levied against contractors that “assist” other firms to violate the law, Olson said.

Olson said his board “has taken steps to ensure that everyone who is licensed is given the opportunity to learn the requirements in the regulations.” But he admits educational efforts “do not, of course, stop contractors from violating the regulations.”

Public contracts stipulate that contractors “do not, and shall not knowingly employ an illegal alien during the performance of the contract for goods and services in Virginia.” But contractors can dodge responsibility because they don’t control who their subcontractors employ.

Profiting in the shadow economy

The state contractor board is a wing of the Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation. DPOR has 200 employees and operates on the fees and fines it collects. The department ran a $2.9 million surplus in fiscal 2012, the latest year for which figures were available.

A consultant’s analysis concluded in 2013 that “DPOR’s purpose was unclear to its employees, hindering their ability to prioritize activities and communicate effectively with the public.”

Use of illegal immigrants in the building trades is widespread, with most workers paid in cash. Under-the-table deals allow laborers and their employers to duck tax obligations, disability coverage and Obamacare mandates.

Catherine Ruckelshaus, general counsel and program director at the National Employment Law Project, calls unlicensed operators “a huge drain on workers’ comp programs.”

The Pew Hispanic Center estimates nearly one in five construction workers nationally are undocumented. Up to 40 percent of brick masons and drywall installers are believed to be in the country illegally.

“This is a sharp rise from 10 percent in 2003,” the Pew report stated.

Olson says unlicensed-contractor cases have flattened in Virginia, but he adds that “complaint-driven” enforcement is problematic.

“We get complaints all the time, but the (state) board has no legal authority to walk onto a job site. Only local permit officers do, and they’re limited. We don’t have the manpower to be everywhere,” he said.

“Everything is driven by price, and people don’t care (about quality). This is why we are stressing consumer education,” Olson added.

David Williams, president of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance, would like to see more effort.

“We would always support enforcement of labor laws and making sure that workers pay taxes on the work that is being done,” he said. “Agencies need to do their job, whether it’s enforcing labor laws or any other law. When citizens pay their taxes, they expect all laws to be enforced.”

Depending on Uncle Sam

Virginia is one of 20 states that require certain contractors to use the federal E-Verify program to vet workers’ legal status, but there are gaping loopholes.

First, the state only requires E-Verify to be used in public-works and public-services contracts. Second, it only covers contractors with an average of 50 or more employees.

Six states — Arizona, Mississippi, South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia and North Carolina — require all or nearly all businesses to use E-Verify, according to a 2012 survey by the Center for Immigration Studies.

Other states have moved in the opposite direction. The most notorious example, California, prohibits all its jurisdictions from requiring private employers to use E-Verify.

While Virginia licensing agencies say they randomly audit contractors and subcontractors, CIS researcher Jon Feere said South Carolina is the only state with an “active audit process.”

Yet state-level enforcement is stymied when crucial data is held in Washington, D.C., where Obama administration policies invite an ongoing influx of foreign labor.

“An audit process necessarily requires a state to obtain a list of employers using E-Verify. Such lists are only available from the federal government. It is clear that better cooperation from federal agencies would make state E-Verify efforts much more effective,” Feere wrote.

Ruckelshaus said 20 states have agreements with the U.S. Department of Labor and the Internal Revenue Service to help sweep up unlicensed operators. But Virginia is not one of them.

Neither the Virginia chapter nor the national office of the American Building Contractors responded to Watchdog.org’s request for an interview.

Attorney General Mark Herring’s office did not comment by deadline.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

The tools now at the tips of consumers’ fingertips, however, have not only revolutionized the way Americans evaluate and use services. With their rise, they have also rendered the argument for government-mandated occupational licensure requirements in fields from cosmetology to interior design less and less relevant.

Online ratings add an element of transparency to simple market forces that have determined business’ success or failure for ages.

“If people are providing a bad service, they’re not going to stay in business,” Johnson said.

Licensing requirements are oftentimes promoted as a protection for consumers, even though some studies have shown states with licensing requirements in a given industry are no less safe than states without such requirements.

The regulatory hand of the state, however, does benefit one group — those in the industry who can afford the fees and time it takes to become licensed. A study released last week by George Mason University’s Mercatus Center, for instance, outlined how opticians in states with licensing requirements earned 2 to 3 percent more than their peers in non-licensing states.

Just because Americans are arming themselves with more information from all the new technological tools available, however, doesn’t mean licensing requirements are tapering off anytime soon.

“What that tells you is consumers have more information than they ever have before. Licensing isn’t going away. It’s actually become more prevalent than it was in the past,” Johnson said.

That’s because industry lobbyists have flocked to statehouses, vying for lawmakers’ attention so that their profession, too, must require a license. Right now, there’s a big push from the yoga and interior design industries to require a license for their fields, something that would make it more difficult for avid health and art enthusiasts to become entrepreneurs in those areas, Johnson said.

As those industry insiders lobby their state governments, consumers and entrepreneurs rarely see the same visibility or advocacy.

“What licensing does is it stands in the way of hardworking entrepreneurs who want nothing more than to make a living in the occupation of their choice,” Johnson said. “And to make a living in this country, you shouldn’t need the permission of the government. All you should need are willing customers.”

Particularly with the rise of ridesharing companies like Uber and Lyft, conversations reconsidering the need for government regulation of industries in general have gained some steam. Earlier this month, President Barack Obama inserted $15 million into his budget to study the rationale behind licensing requirements for some low-wage occupations.

A Yelp spokeswoman wouldn’t go so far as to say Yelp ratings should replace licensing requirements, but emphasized that her company wants consumers to be as informed as possible.

“By providing a platform for consumers to share their experiences with local businesses we give them additional information, beyond that provided by licensing programs, with which to evaluate if a business is the right one for them,” Yelp spokesperson Rachel Walker told Watchdog.org. “We think the more information a consumer has when making a purchase decision, the better.”

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

SCHOOL BOUND: Pending legislation would broaden educational options for special-needs students in Virginia.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — State Delegate Dave LaRock is making an impassioned plea for enactment of education savings accounts, which face intense opposition from institutional special interests.

His House Bill 2238 would provide an average of $4,000 annually to parents of special-needs students to shop for schools and services that best serve their children. The measure has passed the House and will be voted on in the Senate this week.

LaRock, R-Hamilton, cited the case of a Chesapeake boy to illustrate the need for his legislation.

“Carson Luke was only in second grade when workers in his school locked him in a room they called ‘the quiet room,’ a room described by his mother as ‘a concrete room with deadbolts that looks like it’s out of an old Russian prison.’ His hand and foot were both broken as he was shut inside by school workers. Carson has autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder,” LaRock related.

FREEDOM TO CHOOSE: Delegate Dave LaRock says elected leaders should put special-needs children ahead of special interests.

“No parent should ever have to face the nightmarish scenario where they have no choice but to send their child to a public school where their child is terrified, miserable, and failing to get the education he or she needs — but that’s exactly what many parents face,” LaRock noted.

Carson’s story and many others like it were presented to the Virginia General Assembly this year. Lawmakers responded in part by passing a law requiring the Board of Education develop regulatory guidelines for seclusion and restraint that public schools in the Commonwealth would have to follow.

“Ironically, this simple step was opposed by lobbyists for school boards and principals, who wanted more discretion in secluding and restraining their pupils,” LaRock said.

“Carson’s story is symptomatic of a real problem: Public schools are often unable or unwilling to cope with the demands of educating and caring for their special-needs students. And while it’s important to require schools to follow commonsense rules when it comes to secluding and restraining students, it would be naive to think that this law will result in schools suddenly being able to meet the needs of their special-needs pupils,” the Northern Virginia lawmaker said.

LaRock said his ESA proposal will allow parents who opt out of public education to have access to a portion of their child’s share of state public school funding, which they can use for an instructional program custom-tailored to their child’s needs. Families can add to the savings account with their personal funds.

“This program has seen amazing success in other states (including Arizona and Florida) where it has been enacted, and it has life-changing potential for the boys and girls who are trapped in an unfriendly public school environment,” he declared.

But it’s not a done deal in Virginia.

“Just as the professional public school establishment fought the effort to bring some sanity to the practices of seclusion and restraint, many are fighting tooth and nail in a turf war against any hint of educational choice, even for the most needy and vulnerable of their students. Even policies like education savings accounts that would mean better outcomes for students and more dollars per pupil for children who remain in public schools face resistance from the entrenched establishment,” LaRock said.

Officials acknowledge that the number of students in costly special-ed categories is skyrocketing. Rates of students with autism and other health impairments are up 23 percent in just the past five years.

LaRock’s bill would defray public costs associated with special-needs students by diverting 90 percent of the state’s share of those students’ pubic school funding to parents who withdraw that child from school. That state portion would be loaded into a debit card to be used by qualifying families for their children’s education expenses.

Avoiding the politically polarizing term, “voucher,” ESAs have been viewed differently by courts because the money goes directly to parents, who can spend it on things other than private school.

The bill has three big hurdles left. The Virginia Education Association, the state’s biggest teachers’ union, is adamantly opposed to any legislation that uses tax dollars to move children out of public schools. School boards also are resistant, even though their local funding would not be touched by HB 2238.

Having lost their fight in the House, 57-42, opponents will try to corral enough votes in the closely divided Senate to kill the savings accounts. The bill squeaked by on an 8-6 party-line vote in the Committee on Education and Health. If it clears the Senate Finance Committee and wins approval of the full Senate, Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe, supported by the VEA, could be the final stumbling block with his veto pen.

Nevertheless, LaRock remains hopeful. “I’m optimistic that our shared desire to help special needs children reach their full potential will motivate our elected leaders to put special needs children ahead of special interests,” he said.

The measure won the endorsement of Virginia’s NAACP chapter Monday. “In this day of limited funding for education and special needs individuals, this bill offers an opportunity to those parents and their children suffering from dramatic illnesses and disabilities,” said Rodney Thomas, legislative representative of the NAACP Virginia State Conference.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

“Democrats and Republicans are already coming up with ways to spend our money, rather than giving it back,” former Stafford County Supervisor Susan Stimpson told Watchdog.org.

“In typical irresponsible fashion, legislators are proposing recurring expenditures like pay raises for public employees based on one-time surplus revenue. They’re willing to spend a $500 million surplus we may not have next year,” said Stimpson, who is challenging House Speaker Bill Howell in a 28th District Republican primary.

“Ever since he took the helm as the top-ranking Republican in Richmond in 2003, Howell has been a major force behind every major tax hike in Virginia,” Norquist said.

“Under Democrat Gov. Mark Warner in 2004, Bill Howell could have prevented a $615-million tax hike. Instead, he convinced Republicans who opposed the tax to take a hike.”

TARGETING ENABLERS: Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform says deals made by Virginia Republicans have enabled Democrats to ascend to higher office.

The ATR president said the speaker was “even more involved” in boosting taxes in 2007 under Democrat Gov. Tim Kaine.

“Howell sponsored legislation that raised taxes and fees by $500 million and authorized regional tax hikes amounting to more than $600 million annually.”

The Supreme Court later struck down the regional tax hikes as unconstitutional.

“Speaker Howell’s involvement in both of these tax hikes allowed Kaine and Warner to run for U.S. Senate as moderates who could work across the aisle with Republicans. Thanks largely to Bill Howell, Mark Warner and Tim Kaine are now senators,” Norquist said.

Before improved revenue numbers were released this week, the House budget called for a $1.1 billion reduction in general fund spending. It eliminated $42.5 million in debt and $10.2 million in new and increased fees proposed by McAuliffe. The spending plan also set aside $99.5 million for the state’s “rainy day fund.”

Howell spokesman Matt Moran declined to comment on Norquist’s allegations. Moran said House members are working with the Senate conference committee to finalize the budget before the General Assembly adjourns at the end of the month. House leaders say they have already rejected a Senate plan to raise vehicle registration fees.

Stimpson maintains that lawmakers are “effectively setting the stage for more tax hikes.”

“It’s time to cut taxes and give Virginians their money back,” she said.

Delegate Ben Cline, R-Amherst, introduced three tax-cutting measures this session. The House Finance Committee member sought to eliminate levies on food purchased at grocery stores, provide a credit for farmers who donate produce to food banks and ratchet down the state’s top personal income tax rate (currently 5.75 percent) when tax credits expire.

State Sen. Steve Martin, R-Chesterfield, sponsored legislation to reduce taxes and limit state spending to inflation plus population growth.

None of the bills passed.

“When we end up with more revenue than expected, we should give it back. Unfortunately, that’s not happening,” Cline said Thursday.

Shak Hill, who sought the GOP nomination to challenge Warner last year, agrees.

“If you believe in the Constitution of Virginia and limited government, any budget surplus should be returned to the people. It should not become a wealth redistribution tool, or used as found money to be spent at the whim of politicians.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — It may be time to clean off those rose-colored glasses that make occupational licensing regulations appear they’re created for public safety.

Requiring a license for your optician to work definitely serves as a protection — but for his or her paycheck, not necessarily your safety or pocketbook, according to a new study from George Mason University’s Mercatus Center. Opticians — people who fit eyeglasses and contacts, not to be confused with optometrists or ophthalmologists — are just one set of professionals that represent what GMU researchers say is a broader problem of onerous licensing requirements that stifle competition in the United States.

When researchers looked into the 21 states with licensure requirements for opticians from the years 1940 to 2012, they found professionals in those states made 2 or 3 percent more than their counterparts in states without licensure requirements. But researchers also found those hefty licensing fees and lengthy training periods kept poorer individuals from entering the field, and didn’t make any difference in consumers’ safety.

“The unemployment level remains elevated in the United States, but occupational licensing restricts entry into numerous professions,” researchers Edward Timmons and Anna Mills found. “Many licensing laws do not clearly increase public safety and ought to be reexamined by policymakers. Optician licensing is one good candidate. Optician licensing laws potentially raise the cost of vision care without showing any observable change in quality. They restrict competition and increase salaries for opticians, but provide no measurable benefit to consumers.”

States’ varied and confusing occupational licensing requirements have come under increased scrutiny lately. Even President Barack Obama tucked $15 million into his budget proposal to study the rationale behind licensure requirements across professions.

It hasn’t always been the case that states have so much say in who is and who isn’t a legitimate professional. In 1950, only about 1 in 20 workers were required to have the government’s licensed stamp of approval to work. That figure has since climbed to 30 percent of the nation’s workers, according to the Mercatus Center.

What’s more, in today’s age of sites like Angie’s List, Yelp and Healthgrades that allow consumers to rate their experiences at businesses, licensing requirements may be less relevant than ever, Timmons said.

“Online ratings services do help provide consumers with important information to make informed choices about professional services,” Timmons told Watchdog.org via email. “I believe the availability of online ratings services weakens the traditional case that is often put forward for occupational licensing.”

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

NO CONVICTION NEEDED: Police in Virginia will continue being able to take property in drug-related suspected crimes with no conviction.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Virginia state senators quietly killed a bill that would have required a person to be convicted of a crime before law enforcement can seize their property.

Rather than take a “yes” or “no” vote in a 9 a.m. Senate Finance Committee meeting on the snowiest day of the season Tuesday, a handful of Republican and Democratic senators voted to pass the bill by indefinitely skirting an up-or-down vote on a bill with support ranging from tea party groups to the American Civil Liberties Union to the Virginia House of Delegates. Even that politically fractured body supported the push for asset forfeiture reform in a bipartisan vote of 92-6.

“One either believes that the state should have to prove you guilty of a crime before it takes the property it says was used in the crime or you don’t,” said Claire Guthrie Gastañaga, executive director of the Virginia ACLU, in a statement after the bill was killed. “It’s a simple matter of equity, not a complex policy decision. It is clear that Virginia law enforcement agencies have become dependent on the cash they get from seizing and forfeiting property from Virginians, including those who have not been found guilty of a crime. Virginians who believe in basic fairness have been ill served by the Senate Finance Committee today.”

Virginia’s low bar for asset forfeiture and lack of protection for the property owner earned the commonwealth a “D-minus” grade from the Institute for Justice, a libertarian law firm. According to that firm, Virginia law enforcement collected an average of $7.2 million a year between 2000 and 2008.

Delegate Mark Cole, R-Spotsylvania, has pushed for change in a state where the law permits police to seize property related to any suspected drug-related activity, calling it “fundamentally un-American for the government to take someone’s property when they have not been convicted of a crime.”

Here are the senators who voted to pass the bill by, favoring a study of the issue before taking up another bill:

Walter Stosch, R-Henrico

Charles Colgan, D-Manassas City

Janet Howell, D-Fairfax

Dick Saslaw, D-Fairfax County

Tommy Norment, R-Williamsburg

John Watkins, R-Powhatan

Frank Wagner, R-Virginia Beach

Charles Carrico, R-Grayson

Kenneth Alexander, D-Norfolk

Stosch and Colgan, who chair the committee, did not immediately return Watchdog.org’s request for comment.

ROLL BACK TAXES: Shelly Capito rode a tax-cutting agenda to victory in West Virginia last fall. The University of Virginia graduate is the first Republican to win a U.S. Senate seat in the Mountain State in 56 years. Will neighboring Virginia follow her cue?

Others ask: Why not give the millions back to taxpayers — or least cut them a break by adjusting Virginia’s antiquated income-tax brackets for inflation?

State receipts of estimated payments for December and January rose 31 percent from a year ago. The total revenue forecast is up by $245 million in fiscal 2015 and $229 million in fiscal 2016.

House Republicans voted to kill $10.2 million in new and higher fees sought by McAuliffe. Both the governor and the GOP leadership want to stash millions more into the state’s rainy day fund.

“We continue to see an improvement in our major revenue sources,” McAuliffe said. “Current trends show that Virginia’s economy is growing stronger.”

It’s unclear whether lawmakers will go along with McAuliffe’s bid to raise teacher salaries; several localities have already done so on their own. The state’s new largesse gives the Republican-controlled House and Senate an opportunity to recast Virginia’s budget for the next biennium.

Such increases are driven partly by antiquated tax thresholds that push lower-income earners into higher tax brackets. Unadjusted for inflation over the past 30 years, the state tax schedule now has Virginians who earn just $17,000 a year — just above food stamp eligibility — paying the highest individual rate.

Former Delegate Barbara Comstock’s attempt to index tax tables for inflation never got out of the House last year.

Abusive tax formulas that burden taxpayers while governments roll in dough sparked a grassroots revolt in California in 1978. Voters there passed Proposition 13, which continues to freeze property taxes to this day.

Under Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell, Virginia’s budget jumped 14 percent from $84 billion to $96 billion in two years. While the administration rammed through a record tax increase for transit projects, officials found $1 billion in transportation funds languishing in a state checking account.

In a statement, McAuliffe cautioned, “It is critical that we keep an eye on long-term challenges that underscore the urgency of diversifying our economy to ensure stable growth and reliable services for our citizens.”

At a record-setting pace, his administration continues to issue hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer-funded grants and tax breaks to lure businesses to the state. The governor says he needs more money for what critics call his “photo opportunity fund.”

Meanwhile, hundreds of businesses have laid off workers or shut down operations in the past year. The “green agenda” pushed by McAuliffe and the Obama Environmental Protection Agency is blamed for many of the losses.

Pro-market economists maintain that low taxes are crucial to growth and diversification. In contrast, high-tax states such as New York and Illinois have lost companies and productive residents to Southern states where the tax climate is more benign.

Jared Walczak, policy analyst at the Tax Foundation, said neighboring North Carolina, West Virginia and the District of Columbia are now using “triggers” to lower taxes when revenues exceed expectations. Even Massachusetts, which earned the sobriquet Taxachusetts, dropped its income-tax rate last year when collections came in above projections.

John Taylor, president of the Virginia Institute for Public Policy, floated a plan in 2005 to peg any tax hikes to population increases and inflation. In the event of an increase, the proposal included “a referendum for people to say whether they wanted their money back.”

“No politicians of either party liked it,” he said.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

The Hamilton Republican’s bill is buttressed by the House’s transportation funding package, House Bill 1887. That measure, by Delegate Chris Jones, R-Suffolk, prohibits highway maintenance and operating funds from going to transit projects, or to bike lanes or pedestrian trails.

Making congestion reduction the pre-eminent criteria for transportation and land-use planning in Northern Virginia is another blow to Arlington’s streetcar venture.

Watchdog reported late last year that county officials sidetracked the multibillion-dollar project as it struggled for funding and public support.

Though promoters haven’t given up, they haven’t been able to prove streetcars would relieve traffic on Columbia Pike and U.S. 1. Critics, including independent traffic engineers, say the trolleys would actually worsen congestion by reducing traffic lanes.

“The Tide” streetcar in Norfolk has also raised concerns, as local officials seek additional funding to expand the line that has the lowest ridership in the United States.

Bob Chase, president of the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance, has long argued for a prioritized system of approving road and transit projects. He supports LaRock’s bill, which requires that mass transit proposals be evaluated on the same performance-based standard as all other transportation projects.

HB 1470 is already halfway home, having cruised through the House on a 97-0 vote.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

The state collected an average of $7.2 million a year between 2000 and 2008 by seizing cash and selling property involved in suspected drug-related activity, according to the Institute for Justice. In Virginia, no conviction in needed before police can seize property and cash.

Of that money, 90 percent goes to the law enforcement agency that made the seizure. The rest goes to the Department of Criminal Justice Services for law enforcement activities.

It’s that lack of protection for the property owner — that the police can take a person’s property prior to conviction — that earned the state a “D-minus” grade on asset forfeiture laws from the libertarian law firm.

“I believe most commonwealth’s attorneys, sheriffs, and police are using the system responsibly,” Cole said in an email. “However, there is the potential for abuse and it is fundamentally un-American for the government to take someone’s property when they have not been convicted of a crime. This legislation will protect property owners from potential misuse or abuse of the state asset forfeiture provisions.”

Not only that, but a provision attached to Cole’s bill from Delegate Bob Marshall, R-Manassas,provides a remedy for anyone whose property was taken without a conviction. The state would have to return the property or pay back its equivalent, and pay attorney’s fees.

Delegate Joe Morrissey, D-Henrico, tried to push similar reforms to earlier this year, but his recent conviction for contributing to the delinquency of a minor who is now pregnant probably didn’t help the cause of the legislator-by-day, inmate-by-night.

As it stands, the state’s asset forfeiture laws are pretty sweeping. Law enforcement agencies can seize any money or equipment used in “substantial connection” with the illegal creation, sale or distribution of controlled substances, along with any profits traced to the enterprise.

Media reports around the country, Cole said, influenced his decision to push for asset forfeiture reform. But there was at least one case closer to home.

If Cole’s legislation succeeds, proceeds will still benefit police, a practice that started in 1990, when lawmakers directed the proceeds from forfeited money and goods connected to the illegal distribution of narcotics to police. Before then, all proceeds went to the State Literary Fund.

Several commonwealth attorneys offices said asset forfeiture proceeds are used for everything from witness travel costs to drug screening to employee training.

The next step for the asset forfeiture bill is the Senate Finance Committee. If it finds support there, it will head to the Senate for debate.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

RECKLESS? Virginia’s outdated reckless-driving law is a case of “gotcha,” the National Motorists Association says.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. – A reckless-driving law that imposes fines up to $2,500 for driving 81 mph on an interstate highway will continue to punish motorists in Virginia.

Delegate Jeffrey Campbell, R-Marion, tried to revise the “reckless” threshold, which was not changed when the state raised its highway speed limits years ago, but his House Bill 1317 never made it out of the Courts of Justice Committee.

Watchdog.org reported last December that Virginia law allows police to issue $2,500 tickets to motorists driving more than 80 mph. Classified as a Class One misdemeanor, just below a felony, the offense can also carry up to a year of jail time.

“Virginia raised its speed limits a few years ago, but failed to raise the reckless-driving threshold accordingly, so the state’s current reckless-driving law is a real ‘gotcha’ law,” said John Bowman, spokesman for the National Motorists Association.

“Most drivers would be surprised to learn that exceeding the posted interstate speed limit by 11 mph is considered reckless driving.”

Bowman called 85 mph “a more reasonable standard.”

“It would have been a step in the right direction for Virginia motorists, who are already subject to some of the most oppressive traffic enforcement in the country,” he said.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

SIGN LANGUAGE: Students in Limited English Proficiency programs are more expensive to educate and strain resources at schools that can least afford it.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org

Costs for schooling a surging number of limited English proficiency students are soaring — $2.5 billion in the Washington, D.C., region alone. But the federal government, responsible for the influx of immigrants, is ducking the bill.

Alexandria, Va., for example, is spending $25,538 per LEP student. With 4,183 such students enrolled this year, the city’s school district is paying out $107,719,214 for those LEP pupils — a whopping 45.8 percent of the district’s annual instructional budget.

The ranks of LEP students, many of whom come from households where no English is spoken, have jumped 125 percent in the Northern Virginia city since the 2005-2006 school year.

Similar increases are found in neighboring Fairfax and Arlington counties, as well as in D.C. and its Maryland suburbs.

Because LEP students require more intensive and specialized services, district outlays for them run 40 to 50 percent higher than for non-LEP students. And because the federal government is not reimbursing for the rising costs, local school districts and their counties are diverting funds from other programs, says Eric Ruark, director of research for FAIR.

In Maryand’s Prince George’s County, music, arts and gifted and talented programs have been scaled back. Meanwhile, the Central American Solidarity Association, a Latino activist organization, persuaded the predominantly African-American school district to build two facilities for LEP students.

“Educators acknowledge the problem, but the solutions differ,” Ruark told Watchdog. “Some say just spend more money. We say fix the immigration system.”

Dan Stein, president of FAIR, said, “The children shortchanged by the money being siphoned to provide for the needs of the LEP population are most often those from disadvantaged communities where educational resources are already strained.”

The federal government isn’t lifting a finger to clean up the mess it made in its backyard. In Washington, D.C., — where 9,389 LEP students account for nearly 20 percent of the school budget — the feds funded just 3.5 percent of the local district’s education costs. In Alexandria, the federal share is less than 0.5 percent.

“The negative impact on schools is being compounded by conscious decisions by the Obama administration to encourage and reward illegal immigration,” Stein noted. “Unfortunately, for families living in the Washington metro area who cannot afford the $36,264 tuition to send their kids to the Sidwell Friends School, educational interests are being sacrificed by the policies of this administration.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

RICHMOND, Va. — Midway through the 2015 General Assembly, the tea party has cooled down to a lukewarm presence. On the surface, at least.

Tea party rallies, “Don’t Tread on Me” banners and outlandish costumes are seldom seen at the Capitol these days. So where has the conservative conscience of the Republican Party gone?

My conversations with tea party activists point in two directions. I believe both scenarios are correct.

First, tea partyers have learned a lesson from the Left. Alternately marginalized and overrated by the mainstream media, the movement has morphed into multiple issue-driven franchises. Americans for Prosperity, Middle Resolution, Virginians for Quality Health Care, Virginia Food Freedom and a host of other groups now patrol the halls of the General Assembly to promote conservative causes without the tea party imprimatur.

Second, some tea partyers have drifted back into the GOP fold, determined to change the party from the inside. This might seem to confirm what skeptics on the Left have long held: The tea party is nothing more than a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican Party.

Still, a sizable libertarian-paleoconservative faction seeks to wreak havoc on Virginia’s GOP establishment. These true believers want to take down at least three Republican senators this year: Walter Stosch of Glen Allen, Emmett Hanger of Mount Solon and Bryce Reeves of Spotsylvania.

House Speaker Bill Howell, R-Falmouth, is getting a primary challenge from former Stafford County Supervisor Susan Stimpson, who has tea party supporters.

The tea party maintains a state federation, but membership ebbs and flows, frequently on the basis of personal attractions or philosophical fall-outs. When one chapter’s organizer called on fellow tea partyers to vote for Mitt Romney in 2012, that unit blew up.

Internal politics have external consequences. For example, a grassroots campaign to rein in the eminent-domain powers of Virginia’s government-regulated utilities is struggling without tea party assistance. In past years, united tea party foot soldiers would have run to the sound of the guns. Today, this property-rights battle rages in Augusta and Nelson counties with no reinforcements from the right — even as Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe touts Dominion Power’s massive pipeline project.

A targeted approach works with some issues. Education Savings Accounts for select K-12 students passed the House with a substantial push from Middle Resolution. And Fauquier County farmer Martha Boneta has assembled a phalanx of supporters to crack the whip on overbearing land trusts.

As the General Assembly grinds on, one thing appears certain: Virginia’s tea party movement is not the formidable attention-getter it was six years ago. It may not even exist a half-dozen years from now.

To paraphrase Richard Nixon’s infamous prediction upon losing the 1962 California governor’s race, the media and the Left won’t have the tea party to kick around any more. Interpret as you will.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

The bill also temporarily loosens SCC oversight of Dominion, allowing the utility more flexibility to shuffle its portfolios.

Dominion spokesman David Botkins called the measure a “compromise.”

“Some states – such as Virginia and North Carolina – are treated unfairly in the (EPA) proposal because of the ‘greater and unreasonable’ reductions required in carbon dioxide emissions rates relative to other nearby states.” the utility said.

The SCC estimates the EPA rules will tack on at least $5.5 billion in compliance costs and $2.1 billion to prematurely close coal-fired power stations.

Bracing for a showdown over federally imposed carbon emission rules, Wagner said he also wants to give the General Assembly legal resources to fight the EPA. Wagner’s Senate Joint Resolution 308 remains stalled in committee.

Wagner’s two-pronged strategy may be the last line of defense against tougher EPA rules.

SB 1442, which would have blocked spending by Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s Department of Environmental Quality until multiple lawsuits against the EPA are resolved, died in the Senate.

State Sen. John Watkins, R-Midlothian, meanwhile, stunned consumer advocates by gutting state and consumer protections initially contained in his SB 1365.

“You might as well call it the McAuliffe-Watkins bill,” energy consultant Randy Randol told Watchdog.org in an interview. “Voting for the Watkins bill is like voting for a rate increase.”

Watkins, who is retiring this year, has angered fellow Republicans for straying from the party line.

Randol – along with Americans For Prosperity, small businesses and tea party groups — supports Delegate Israel O’Quinn’s HB 2291.

The Bristol Republican’s plan would require legislative approval before any DEQ emissions plans could be submitted for EPA approval.

But O’Quinn’s bill may be dead, too. Speaker Bill Howell, R-Falmouth, ruled Monday that because the measure also calls for a study, it was introduced too late. The bill’s only lifeline would be to add it to Wagner’s SB 1349.

Washington’s Clean Power Plan aims to sharply reduce pollution from power plants, requiring Virginia to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 38 percent by 2030. Dominion has warned that it might have to retire many of its coal-fired power plants to comply.

Though environmental groups support the EPA gambit, Randol said the coalition with consumers and minority groups has fractured.

FOIA CHARGES: Different schools charge different amounts for the same FOIA request. Some charge $0, while UVA is requesting $500.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — It isn’t news to anyone paying tuition at one of Virginia’s public universities that different schools charge different tuition rates.

It turns out those different price tags apply to requests for public information, too.

In light of a recent state audit pointing out universities’ massive travel tabs, Watchdog.org requested the employment contracts and two years’ worth of travel expense records for all of Virginia’s 15 public university presidents.

In the end, public records estimates were not created equally. Virginia law allows public bodies charge a “reasonable” amount that doesn’t exceed the actual cost of producing the documents. But that word “reasonable” is up for interpretation, and can be settled only by a judge.

The University of Virginia wants to charge the most for its president’s contract and travel records — $510. They reached that figure by estimating it would take seven hours at $45 an hour for the “staff time searching and collecting potentially responsive records.”

Then, once those potentially relevant records were compiled, administrators estimated it would take another three hours at $65 an hour for the “staff time searching, collecting and reviewing records for responsiveness.” UVA noted that those costs are based on the employee’s base salary, which, at $65 an hour, would be about $135,000 a year.

UVA’s separate liberal arts college, UVA College at Wise, took a different approach. Kathy Still, the university’s director of news and media relations, said it’s generally their practice to give public records free. Radford University and George Mason University also said the records would be available free of charge.

Other schools, like Lexington’s Virginia Military Institute, charged something in between. VMI requested $60 to produce the records. Blacksburg’s Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University wanted $52.

Megan Rhyne, executive director for the Virginia Coalition for Open Government, said she’s noticed a gradual uptick in the hourly rate government agencies charge for public records.

“It seems like five years ago, hourly rate people tended to be people whose job it was to handle FOIA requests,” Rhyne said. “They weren’t a manger or they weren’t that high up. So you’d be charged somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 an hour.”

But that isn’t the case anymore, she said. Now, staff attorneys or people at the top of the information technology food chain do the work.

“It does seem that more highly paid individuals are getting involved in the FOIA process,” Rhyne said. “I don’t necessarily mean to imply they’re doing that as a way to jack up fees, but I do think it’s a byproduct of shrinking budgets. They have fewer employees, they’re trying to do more with less.”

But prices don’t just vary at government agencies. Often, the same agency will charge different people different prices for the same or a similar request.

Journalists sometimes get off the hook, for example, while citizens who who don’t mine public records for a living have to pay.

“I’ve been in touch with citizens who have been charged for certain records, and then I hear from a reporter that they just gave that record. Over the years, from talking with a lot of my reporter friends, it is clear that many of them do get their records at little or no cost,” Rhyne said.

Watchdog.org will be reporting the findings of those employment benefits and travel records in the weeks ahead.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

RICHMOND, Va. – Watchdog.org’s report on controversial “sneak and peek” legislation approved by the Virginia House and Senate is triggering a backlash from civil-liberties activists — and buyer’s remorse from some lawmakers.

The measures extend federal Patriot Act powers to the state Attorney General’s Office and allow local law-enforcement agencies to seal “administrative subpoenas.” Targets of sweeping subpoenas would not be notified authorities were seizing their financial, phone and computer records.

Mark Fitzgibbons, a constitutional attorney in Northern Virginia, blames the Courts of Justice Committee for greasing the fast track to approval.

“The committee failed to do its job by giving its imprimatur to legislation that is clearly illegal under the Fourth Amendment, and also violates the First Amendment for gagging recipients of the subpoenas.”

Anderson called the bills “an egregious intrusion on Fourth Amendment protections. (But) we have such a tempo down here (in Richmond) that it’s difficult to get the desk time to review legislation.”

Anderson had introduced House Joint Resolution 578, a constitutional amendment, to void privacy-killing laws. It stipulated that “warrants and other (subpoena) demands shall be issued only based upon probable cause” – not merely part of an “ongoing investigation.”

BEN’S LEGACY LIVES IN VIRGINIA: A bipartisan group of civil libertarian-minded lawmakers convenes as the Ben Franklin Privacy Caucus each Friday in Richmond.

The measure never got out of subcommittee.

Anderson and Sen. Chap Petersen, D-Fairfax, the lone dissenter to SB 919, founded the Ben Franklin Privacy Caucus last year to discuss civil-liberties issues. The group meets at 8 a.m. every Friday in the Fifth Floor West Conference Room of the General Assembly Building.

Nicholas Cote, president of Right Way Forward Virginia, said his libertarian group will play a more active role in future legislative sessions.

“The next step is to get the candidates for General Assembly in 2015 on the record about where they stand on issues related to the Fourth Amendment.” said Cote. He calls the bills by Sen. Jennifer Wexton, D-Leesburg, and Delegate Jennifer McClellan, D-Richmond, part of an ongoing erosion of rights.

“Make no mistake, the bills are bad, but the threat to privacy, unfortunately, is nothing new,” Cote told Watchdog.

“What’s troubling about Wexton/McClellan is that the administrative subpoena can be sealed without the prosecutor going before a judge, including at the whim of the prosecutor if he or she believes the disclosure of the subpoena would ‘seriously jeopardize any investigation,’” Cote said.

“The judiciary ought to check the power of law enforcement, especially when the investigations are secret and have the potential to simply be fishing expeditions.”

Fitzgibbons says lawmakers in the post-9/11 era are eviscerating laws enacted their predecessors. He points to Section 19.2-54 of the Virginia Code, which spells out the limits of subpoena power.

“If the General Assembly wants people to follow the law, they had better start respecting our paramount law, the Constitution,” he said.

Anderson believes the Wexton and McClellan bills can still be stopped. He told Watchdog he expects “some sort of parliamentary move (to derail the legislation) now that people have been alerted.”

The public can hold politicians’ feet to the fire this year, Cote says.

“We ought to have a robust public debate about the impact of law enforcement’s policies on our privacy. Virginians concerned about civil liberties across the political spectrum ought to take the opportunity to force that discussion in an election year, the time when the politicians are listening most to the people,” he said.

Tim Wise, president of the Arlington County Taxpayers Association, is doing exactly that. Wise last week called on ACTA members to contact their lawmakers “to express their outrage” over the Wexton/McClellan bills.

Sen. Jeff McWaters proposed a bill to ban releasing any balloons into the atmosphere. It fell flat, barely.

RICHMOND, Va. — Lawmakers try to make just about anything illegal these days.

The Virginia Senate came close to banning people from releasing balloons into the atmosphere. No, that isn’t a joke.

Republican Sen. Jeff McWaters of Virginia Beach proposed a bill banning anyone from intentionally letting balloons sail away into the air, earning the playful derision of his conservative colleagues. Believe it or not, 16 senators voted for the ban. Their hopes were deflated by the 21 senators who voted against a ban on Friday.

Republican Sen. Bill Stanley joked that anything — like ice cream cones — could be banned if releasing balloons is an illegal act.

Republican Sen. Ryan McDougle said his young daughter recently wanted to buy a balloon. McDougle told her she couldn’t have one, because a friend of his wanted to ban releasing balloons into the air. McDougle’s daughter, he said, told her father McWaters must be a “bad man” who should go to jail.

The bill would have allowed a $5 fine per balloon released into the air.

As the law already stands, it’s illegal to release 50 or more “nonbiodegradable” or “nonphotodegradable” balloons within a one-hour period.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

NOT IN THIS HOUSE: Delegate Scott A. Surovell, D-Fairfax, talks to the members Monday in the House of Delegates in Richmond, about some of the things you are not allowed to bring into the State Capitol, including flags, sirens and balloons, even though guns are allowed. Outspoken, Surovell wants more protections for drivers from police use of automatic license plate readers.

A bill from Republican Delegate Richard Anderson says “law enforcement” and “regulatory agencies” may only keep data collected by ALPR cameras, devices that randomly capture and store a vehicle’s exact position at an exact time, for seven days.

But Surovell pointed out other government bodies could still employ the cameras and store that information. Surovell also argued the bill does nothing to keep police from handing that information over to other government bodies to use. Somewhere around 20 Virginia police agencies mount ALPR cameras to scan plates, according to Dana Schrad, executive director of the Virginia Chiefs of Police.

“The way I read it, the Department of Taxation could say, ‘well we’re not a regulatory agency. We want to use this to find people who aren’t paying their car taxes,’” Surovell said before the House Committee on Militia, Police and Public Safety on Friday.

“My second concern is that the way I read this, there’s nothing in here that prohibits law enforcement from giving this to somebody else and letting them play with it,” Surovell said. “It’s not subject to outside inquiries, but it doesn’t say they can’t just give it all to somebody else, let somebody else store it, maintain it, play with it, mine it.”

When Virginia State Police Lt. Tom Bradshaw said the “Department of State Police has not given that information out to anybody,” Surovell fired back.

“I know that,” a forceful Surovell said. “The question isn’t whether you do it or not. The question is whether you could do it. If we have a D.C. sniper and you guys are unhappy that seven days isn’t enough you start giving the data to the FBI, you start giving it to who knows so they can take it, hold it, keep it, and they can play with it, and you’re following the law, because you’ve destroyed it after seven days. That’s my concern — not what your practice is, what could you do?”

The controversy over ALPRs began in fall 2013, after the Virginia State Police scanned plates at political rallies for Sarah Palin and Barack Obama, and asked Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli if that was legal. He said in an official opinion it was illegal, and the VSP has kept plate information for 24 hours since then.

The committee gave an 11-4 nod of approval to the seven-day retention bill, which now moves to the full House of Delegates. A similar bill received unanimous approval from the Senate on its first reading.

But the influential law enforcement community has spoken out strongly against the seven-day period, and is pushing to extend that time period to 60 days. Anderson told Watchdog.org he expects that some of his colleagues in the House will push to let police to keep the information longer, too.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

“The House Republican proposal will strengthen the safety net for the neediest people in Virginia. It increases access to services without creating a new government program,” said Delegate John O’Bannon, R-Henrico.

The House Appropriations Committee will consider the budget plan 1 p.m. Sunday. The health-care package includes $124.2 million more for mental health care and “targeted safety net services for needy Virginians.”

“Last year, the General Assembly made significant investments in mental health care. We are building on those investments,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Chris Jones, R-Suffolk.

“It relies on the false promise of free federal money and creates a new welfare entitlement system for able-bodied working adults,” the Augusta Republican said.

With Republicans holding a veto-proof majority in the House, the GOP plan figures to win easy approval. At this point, the more closely divided Senate has not indicated it has any designs on Medicaid expansion.

Spokesmen for McAuliffe — who was at a Brookings Institution forum in Washington, D.C., to tout “advanced technologies” — did not respond to Watchdog’s request for comment.

Craig DiSesa, legislative policy director for the market-based group, Middle Resolution, said, “Removing Medicaid expansion from the governor’s budget amendment and defunding the Healthy Virginia initiative are further evidence that Speaker Bill Howell and the House Republicans are serious about reducing Virginia’s dependence on the federal government, and, at the same time, trying to take care of the most vulnerable in Virginia.”

Healthy Virginia began enrolling individuals with serious mental illness last month after Washington approved a Medicaid waiver to allow the program.

NO INVESTIGATIONS, PLEASE: Republican Todd Gilbert said an ethics commission with investigative powers would be a “terrible idea.”

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Despite all the grandstanding about cleaning house after the conviction of former Gov. Bob McDonnell on federal corruption charges, Virginia lawmakers are on track to maintain the commonwealth’s status as one of eight states in the country with no ethics commission.

That is, as long as you don’t consider an inactive ethics advisory body with no authority to investigate or penalize an actual ethics commission.

A bill sailing through the Virginia House of Delegates would require lawmakers to go before the currently non-active Virginia Conflict of Interest and Ethics Advisory Council to get waivers for some third-party-paid expenses above $100, like travel or lodging.

But the proposal from Republican Delegate Todd Gilbert doesn’t make any room for that council to launch investigations or impose penalties for someone who violates the law.

Gilbert said it would be a “terrible idea” to create an independent commission with investigative powers, arguing that would offer an outlet for “political vendettas.”

In a different Senate panel on the subject, Republican Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment had the guts to say lawmakers are only pursuing ethics reform because of pressure from the media.

Several months before he was appointed to serve under Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, then-HUD Deputy Secretary Jones sent an email to more than 1,000 “friends and colleagues,” urging them to contact their senators in support of the Senate version of a 2014 appropriations bill for HUD and other federal departments, the GAO said.

But the GAO investigated, and found Jones definitely violated a “bright-line rule” prohibiting federal agencies from indirect or grassroots lobbying over specific bills before Congress. The GAO report said HUD and Jones also violated another federal law, which says government officers and employees can’t authorize any expense that Congress hasn’t already appropriated.

Sending an email is, of course, free on face value, but the GAO factored in the time and equipment it took to organize and send the email.

The congressional inquiry into Jones’ actions unfolded last year as he was about to be confirmed, delaying his state-level confirmation by a few days.

As secretary of Commerce and Trade, Jones is responsible for about a dozen state agencies.

Jones did not return two messages requesting a comment on Wednesday.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

SMILE, YOU’RE ON CAMERA: A bill limiting the retention of ALPR data barely made it through a Senate committee.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — The room was still as 15 state senators offered an “aye” or a “no” one by one, indicating whether they wished to expand a proposal for how long police can keep automatic license plate reader-collected data from seven days to 60 days.

At first, it wasn’t clear which side would win the Monday battle over how long police can keep information that conveys the exact coordinates of a citizen’s vehicle — quite possibly, your own — at a given second.

A bill from Democratic Sen. Chap Petersen called to limit it to seven days, which was already longer than he wanted, given that former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli called the random collection of such license plate data without a warrant illegal. Cuccinelli issued that opinion after the Virginia State Police had used the cameras to capture plates at political rallies for Barack Obama and Sarah Palin. The VSP ultimately adopted a 24-hour retention policy. But Republican Sen. Dick Black pushed for a 60-day retention period in the Senate Committee on General Laws and Technology. Right now, local police agencies are keeping the data as long as they wish.

The seven-day limit eventually passed out of the committee, 12-3, with Sens. Jill Vogel, Dick Black and Bryce Reeves — all Republicans — dissenting. It now heads to the full Senate.

As in many committee meetings related to police authority, the voices of law enforcement were clear and well represented. In a state Legislature dominated by Republicans, the clash between the liberties those lawmakers claim to hold dear, and their loyalty to police and public safety is all too real.

“We oppose this bill,” said Dawn Harman, an assistant chief for operations at the Prince William County Police Department, who said 60 days is still far too short. She pushed for a six-month limit. Lt. Thomas Bradshaw with the Virginia State Police mentioned 9/11 and the Boston Marathon Bombing as grounds for being able to track the whereabouts of currently unsuspected citizens.

Dana G. Schrad, executive director of the Virginia Associations of Chiefs of Police, also stepped up to oppose a seven-day retention period. The Commonwealth’s Attorney for the City of Lynchburg, Michael R. Doucette, dubbed Cuccinelli’s analysis that collecting and retaining LPR data is illegal as “flawed.”

John Jones, executive director of the Virginia Sheriffs Association, said police should be able to keep the data, but non-police shouldn’t be able to access it.

Only Claire Gastañaga, executive director of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, argued the need for liberty and for the most limited data retention period possible. “The current state of the law we believe is that there are no days, and frankly, we would prefer that,” she told lawmakers.

Following the vote, Peterson released a statement noting the “formidable opposition” of law enforcement, “who are usually my very good friends and allies on legal issues.

“Suffice to say there is a fundamental philosophical disagreement between our views of government data collection. My premise is pretty simple: the state should not use surveillance technology to collect information on its citizens when there is no discrete reason to do so.”

So far, this particular attempt to temper police authority and protect civil liberties has fared better than many other attempts in the General Assembly.

This doesn’t surprise John Whitehead, civil liberties advocate and president of the Rutherford Institute. He said he’s seen a “shift” towards “pro-police” in general since the riots in Ferguson, Missouri.

“The other thing is, the police unions are very, very powerful,” he said. “They run the show.”

The Fraternal Order of Police, the Southern State Police Benevolent Association, the Virginia State Police Association and the Virginia Sheriffs Association all employ lobbyists at the General Assembly, and many members of local police orders show up at legislative meetings and donate to candidates. Since 1996, for example, the Virginia Sheriffs Association has donated more than $1.2 million to political campaigns and candidates in Virginia, according to the Virginia Public Access Project.

Lately, Whitehead said talk radio and even entertainment stations that normally have him on their shows have closed off the lines of communication, citing pushback from law enforcement unions.

Republicans in particular may say they stand for liberty, but when it comes to anything to do with police authority, they cave, he said.

“It’s hypocritical,” Whitehead said.

The retention of license plate information or the use of drones may seem harmless, but watch out in the future, Whitehead warned.

“Sooner or later with all of the intelligence information, if you speak out, they’ll use it against you,” he said.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

PAY UP: Toll roads built and operated by an Australian company are spreading in Northern Virginia. A Republican challenger to House Speaker Bill Howell says the state is heading in the wrong direction.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — Merging into Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s lane, the GOP-controlled House is pushing for more rail projects and more tolls on Virginia roads.

Susan Stimpson wants it all to stop, and head in the opposite direction.

“They are moving this through so fast, it’s unconscionable,” said the Stafford County Republican, who is challenging House Speaker Bill Howell in a June primary.

“This is a fundamental shift from using tax dollars to fix roads to adding tolls and shifting to mass transit,” the former Stafford supervisor told Watchdog.org. “It represents a change in overarching transportation policy, with really no discussion.”

If approved, the Republican House’s rail and toll agenda isn’t likely to get pushback from McAuliffe. A relentless promoter of mass transit, the Democratic governor has also touted new and proposed toll lanes in Northern Virginia.

“This strengthens the public-private partnership with Transurban,” Stimpson said of the Australian-based company that built and operates the recently completed toll lanes on I-95 north of Fredericksburg.

“This type of Solyndra-style deal is the last thing we need,” she said, likening so-called Virginia’s “P3” arrangements to the federal government’s solar subsidy boondoggle.

According to Stimpson, the state is “leveraging private debt for road improvements and tolling citizens for using them. Instead of using our tax dollars for infrastructure, they’re double taxing.”

House Bill 1887, sponsored by Delegate Chris Jones, R-Suffolk, effectively converts the Governor’s Transportation Opportunity Fund to a slush fund for road projects, with little or no oversight, Stimpson charged.

While allowing for the pooling of toll revenue on one roadway for use on projects elsewhere, the legislation would shift funding responsibility for secondary roads to localities, Stimpson said.

Proponents of the bill disagree. They say local districts will get more money for roadwork under the plan.

Despite Stimpson’s critique, the House sent HB 1887 to the Senate on a 96-2 vote Wednesday afternoon. Only Delegates Bob Marshall, R-Manassas, and Mark Berg, R-Winchester, voted no.

Delegate Dave LaRock, R-Hamilton, was one of just three Republicans to vote against the bill in committee. Delegates Jim LeMunyon, R-Chantilly, and Tim Hugo, R-Centreville, were the others.

“Every email we have received supporting the bill has been from transit organizations or localities touting it benefits to (mass) transit,” LaRock’s office said in an email Wednesday morning.

LaRock is sponsoring HB 1470 to require transit projects funded by the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority to be evaluated on the same performance-based standard as all other transportation projects.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

Fittingly, the Wexton-McClellan measures are quietly rolling through the General Assembly with little or no public notice.

State Sen. Chap Petersen, D-Fairfax, was the lone vote against Wexton’s bill.

“It’s a bad idea — I can’t believe no one else voted no,” he told Watchdog.

Whitehead, president of the Charlottesville-based Rutherford Institute, called the measures “very Gestapo.”

Noting that the FBI uses 30,000 “national security letters” a year to conduct searches under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, Whitehead said, “The Fourth Amendment is dead. There is no privacy any more.”

The Wexton-McClellan bills would grant similar powers to local authorities who simply assert their searches are “relative to an ongoing investigation.”

Mark Fitzgibbons, a Northern Virginia attorney, said the bills “eviscerate probable cause to a standard of ‘reason to believe that the records or other information being sought are relevant to a legitimate law-enforcement investigation concerning violations.’”

“The Writs of Assistance (general warrants) were passed by Parliament in violation of the common law standards of being signed by a judge, after oath and affirmation of a witness, and describing with specificity the place to be searched. Those standards are found in the Fourth Amendment. Virginia has come full circle,” Fitzgibbons said.

Neither Wexton nor McClellan responded to Watchdog’s requests for comment by deadline. McClellan did have time, however, to post a salute to State Police who filled the House gallery on Tuesday.

“Thank you to the Virginia State Troopers for their service to the Commonwealth,” she retweeted, with photos attached.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

DANGEROUS POLICY: Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, says he’s determined to curb the administration’s “prosecutorial discretion” and deport criminal immigrants who remain in the United States illegally.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org

More than 1,000 illegal immigrants released under federal “prosecutorial discretion” went on to commit a string of new crimes across the United States, according to Department of Homeland Security records. And that was in just one year.

The 38-page DHS report lists the new convictions for fiscal 2013, the latest year for which statistics were available. They include:

Assault with a deadly weapon

Terroristic threats

Failure to register as a sex offender

Lewd acts with a child under 14

Aggravated assault

Robbery

Hit-and-run

Criminal street gang

Rape spouse by force

Child cruelty: possible injury/death

“The Obama administration claims it is using ‘prosecutorial discretion’ to prioritize the removal of criminal aliens from this country. But this report shows the disturbing truth: 1,000 undocumented aliens previously convicted of crimes, and released by the administration in 2013, have gone on to commit further crimes in our communities,” said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa.

Grassley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, vowed: “I will continue my work to ensure our immigration officials are doing what it takes to take criminal aliens off our streets and out of our country.”

Officials at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement have complained about lack of bed space to house criminal immigrants. According to a Government Accountability Office report, the cost of detaining criminal aliens from 2005 to 2009 was estimated at $1.6 billion annually.

“Given the increase in undocumented immigrants, the current costs may be higher,” Judiciary Committee press secretary Taylor Foy said. “That also does not take into account the cost of releasing criminal aliens into supervised release programs.”

The resulting public endangerment and strain on local law-enforcement agencies sparked an outcry from immigration-enforcement groups Monday.

Jessica Vaughn, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, told Watchdog, “This report confirms what many of us feared, and what ICE officers know, namely that policies that lead to the release of criminal aliens back into our communities undermines public safety and is creating needless new victims.”

“These offenders should be sent home, not allowed to stay here.”

She added: “The president is constantly claiming that his policies allow ICE officers to focus on ‘felons, not families.’ In fact, they prevent ICE officers from dealing with felons, and the criminal aliens who will become felons.”

SECOND CHANCE: Apolinar Altamirano is one of the 36,000 criminal immigrants freed by ICE in 2013. Now he is back in custody, charged in the murder of an Arizona store clerk.

“(Apolinar Altamirano) is one of the 36,000 who were freed by ICE in 2013. He was a convicted felon when ICE released him in 2013, but ICE officers have been told to release such offenders — without supervision.”

Bob Dane, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, said, “Statistics say that one in six criminal illegal aliens who get released get rearrested. Catch and release is good practice for fishing, but not a good one for law enforcement.”

Vaughn said Congress can stop the White House’s criminal merry-go-round.

“Congress has the opportunity to end the Obama administration’s reckless ‘prosecutorial discretion’ policies by passing the DHS appropriations bills with riders that halt the president’s executive actions,” she said.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

Sen. Ryan McDougle is trying to make school budgets a little more transparent.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — With just a click, taxpayers may soon have a little more clarity on how their school division plans to spend their hard-earned money.

Mark Hile, a Henrico County resident and local member of the tea party, wanted to see each school division list its budgets by line item online, instead of in broad, sweeping categories. So, SB 1286, sponsored by Sen. Ryan McDougle, was born.

“It’s just a way to have more openness and transparency in the process, Hile told Watchdog.org. “… This is just holding fiscally accountable all levels of government.”

McDougle’s bill, which passed unanimously out of the Senate Subcommittee on Public Education on Monday, would bring budget transparency in schools up to the same level as the state’s budget. When a representative from the 80,000-student Prince William Public Schools objected that a line-item budget would be 3,000 pages for his county, McDougle pointed out the state’s budget is far longer than that.

“It should not be that challenging to do,” McDougle said.

Virginia’s largest school division, Fairfax County, boasts a budget of about $7 billion.

Some school divisions already post their budgets by line item online, but others do not. A budget, of course, is simply a blueprint for spending — not the end result.

In 2013, the Sunshine Review gave Virginia a ‘B+’ for the transparency of its school division websites, one of the best grades in the country.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

SPOTSYLVANIA, Va. – U.S. Rep. Dave Brat says he wants to be the “most boring guy in Congress.” That doesn’t mean the freshman congressman is quietly going along to get along.

The populist Republican who knocked out House Majority Leader Eric Cantor last fall in a stunning Virginia primary says his first eight weeks on Capitol Hill “seemed like 14 years.”

“I’m even more in favor of term limits,” the former Randolph-Macon College professor said.

“We need some big, big changes,” Brat told Watchdog.org in an interview. But he said he sees no sign of things turning around as long as D.C. remains mired in politics as usual.

“I’m a macro-economic guy,” the former economics and ethics instructor said. “I vote no if it’s bad for the country.”

Citing recent examples, the 7th Congressional District lawmaker opposed the bloated Cromnibus spending bill, as well as funding for the Export-Import Bank, derisively known as “Boeing’s Bank” for its corporate dealings. He also voted against returning John Boehner as House speaker, while managing to hold onto his seats at the budget, education and workforce committees when the Ohio Republican was re-elected.

Brat urges conservatives – and Americans at large — to stay focused on “big issues.”

“The Keystone pipeline is symbolic. Don’t over-hype it. What’s most important is speeding up the whole economy,” he said.

In that vein, Brat said the country would be better served by “getting rid of the EPA, which is killing off small businesses.”

“When you increase the supply of cheap labor by 12 million workers through amnesty, wages go down,” he said.

Sounding more like firebrand Democratic Massachusetts U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren than buttoned-down Mitt Romney, the GOP congressman notes, “The bottom 80 percent of American workers are losing. This is what 2016 is all about: Who’s really going to help the middle class?”

While Brat and Warren talk tough about crony capitalism, he parts company with the Massachusetts liberal on policy. “They have no solutions,” Brat said of Warren and other statist Democrats. “We do.”

The prescription, he said, starts with smaller government, free markets and, most importantly, the rule of law. If voting that way is boring or discommodes the Republican establishment, so be it.

“I ran on economics, and everyone is going to know how I’m going to vote because I follow the Constitution. It’s about what’s good for the country — not what’s good for special interests.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

RICHMOND, Va. — Delegate Bill Howell’s primary opponent is accusing the Republican Party of taking sides by mailing a glossy “survey” for the House speaker.

Susan Stimpson’s campaign charges that party officials crossed the line from constituent outreach to outright campaigning by using their bulk mail permit to post the piece filled with colorful pictures of Howell and his family.

Stimpson called the action “unconscionable” and a “reckless disregard for rules.”

Party-paid constituent surveys are not unusual. Democratic and Republican parties routinely mail them on behalf of their office holders. But Howell’s four-page packet stands out. It arrived amid a primary challenge by Stimpson, former chairwoman of the Stafford County Board of Supervisors.

According to the Republican Party of Virginia Plan, the RPV “shall not endorse, nor contribute to from its funds, any candidate who is running for a Republican nomination for public office unless that candidate is unopposed for that nomination.”

ON THE ATTACK: Susan Stimpson is calling out House Speaker Bill Howell and state Republican officials over a mailing she says violates party rules.

Stimpson, who has blasted Howell for orchestrating billions of dollars in state tax increases during his nearly 30 years at the General Assembly, said she does not want the party’s help getting her message out.

“By paying for a slick mailer promoting Speaker Howell while he faces a primary challenge over his long record of tax and spending increases, the Republican Party of Virginia has broken its own rules,” Stimpson said in an email to Watchdog.org.

“It is unconscionable that Bill Howell’s consultants and rogue staff‎ would blatantly ignore the party’s explicit rule against being involved in a primary. This reckless disregard for rules is just another example of the corrosive effects of power that have led Howell to raise taxes repeatedly,” Stimpson said.

Howell spokesman Matthew Moran declined to comment.

Howell’s political action committee has bolstered the state party coffers with tens of thousands of dollars in contributions over the years.

The cost of producing and posting the Howell mailer is not known. But it clearly goes beyond the postcard-size questionnaires distributed by Democrats.

RVP Chairman John Whitbeck and party Executive Director Shaun Kenney did not respond to Watchdog requests.

Virginia’s primary elections are June 9. The 28th House District, which straddles Stafford and Spotsylvania counties, is solidly Republican.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

Think of it as taking a highlighter to anything slipped into the budget at the last minute.

“You could call this the (Nancy) Pelosi bill because the idea is you want people to have time to read the budget and understand the final version of the budget,” O’Bannon said, referencing the infamous line from U.S. Sen. Nancy Pelosi on the Affordable Care Act.

The state Senate’s now-Majority Leader, Republican Tommy Norment, filed a similar bill last year. It died in committee after confusion ensued over exactly what it would do.

The way the budgeting process works, the House and Senate each pass their own versions of a budget bill. Then, conferees from both the House and Senate meet to meld the two together, before everyone votes on a final bill.

Plenty of people have worried about lawmakers “legislating through the budget,” O’Bannon said.

“So it’s just a transparency thing,” he said.

The next step for the bills is making it through their respective rules committees. The legislation requires the chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations, and the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee to create the reports.

The more transparency the better, said Megan Rhyne, executive director of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government.

“The more comprehensive the information and the more advance notice that is given of the budget, the better it is for the public, the business community and the advocacy community,” she said. “All Virginians are entitled to know how funds are being spent and prioritized.”

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

POWER SHIFT: EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy proposes to swap fossil fuel power with intermittent wind sources in Virginia. A bill to be heard Thursday would put the state’s General Assembly in the way of that plan.

Targeting both the EPA and the state’s Department of Environmental Quality, Senate Bill 1442 would require General Assembly approval of any rules submitted to Washington by the DEQ.

The Virginia State Corporation Commission concluded that the EPA power plan “is likely to increase substantially the bills and rates Virginians pay for their electricity, and could impact significantly the reliability of the electrical service they receive.”

SB 1442, introduced by Sen. Frank Wagner, R-Virginia Beach, would halt all spending by the DEQ until multiple lawsuits against the EPA are resolved. The bill would also require that SCC staff, not the DEQ, perform a complete analysis of the costs and effects of the EPA plan.

The Senate Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources Committee is scheduled to hear the bill Thursday.

Carol Stopps, spokeswoman for the Virginia Tea Party Patriots Federation, called it “one of the most important bills of the year.”

Boost compliance costs for one utility — Dominion Virginia Power — by $5.5 to $6 billion.

Stick Virginia electricity consumers with billions of dollars in “stranded” costs for existing facilities that are forced to retire prematurely. This include recent investments in existing coal-fired facilities.

Impose substantially more stringent emission requirements for existing generating units in Virginia than the standard for new units, yet to be built.

The SCC report concluded that the EPA plan “incorporates generic and unsupported expectations of levels of renewable generation and energy efficiency that, when applied to Virginia, are extremely ambitious (and) almost certainly unachievable.”

“Virginia would have little, if any, input regarding the compliance obligations for a substantial amount of out-of-state generation currently used to maintain reliable electric service at just and reasonable rates for Virginia consumers.”

Randol said, “The EPA has doubled down on bad policy. The existing power plant rule is in addition to other rules that will impose regressive costs on Virginia seniors and the poor.”

McAuliffe’s press office did not respond to Watchdog’s request for comment.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

SCHOOL SCHOLARSHIPS: A new tax credit scholarship in Virginia is picking up steam.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Virginia has long received poor marks for its approach to school choice.

Time will tell whether that changes.

An education savings account bill is still up in the air, but an already existing tax credit scholarship program is picking up steam. Enacted by the General Assembly in 2012, the Education Improvement Scholarships Tax Credit offers a credit equal to 65 percent of the amount a business or person donates to an approved scholarship foundation. That foundation then foots about $2,400, on average, of the bill for low-income and disabled students at the private school of their choice.

“The trouble is in public schools, if a kid is economically at risk, he’s probably in an economically at-risk school, and that school may not have the resources to address that child’s specific learning needs,” Braunlich said.

Right now, the scholarships have helped about 1,000 students, but that number is almost sure to grow. Braunlich estimates the program is on track to give $5 million in scholarships by the end of this fiscal year, compared with $2 million the past fiscal year.

But there’s an economic benefit to the state — and the taxpayers. The tax credit the state gives the donating business or person is less than the $4,000 the state would otherwise give the local school division to educate the child.

“Long story short, the cost of the credit is going to be less than the amount of money the state will save when the students don’t enter the public school,” Braunlich said.

It may not be the perfect method, but it’s one education reformers have opted for in light of Virginia’s tricky laws.

Virginia’s leaders in centuries past, trying to keep government out of religion and put local issues in the hands of local governments, passed constitutional amendments prohibiting the state from funding religious education and placing all funding authority in the hands of local school divisions. The courts have vigorously upheld those restrictions when challenged.

For advocates of more choice in education, that means voucher-type options, like other states have, are virtually impossible, and few school divisions are willing to create their own competition in the form of a charter school.

“If they don’t want to see something innovatively different in a local charter school, it won’t happen,” Braunlich said.

Leslie Hiner, vice president of programs and state relations for the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice, said she has hope for Virginia.

“You have a great tax credit there, so now the big thing is to make it work, help people understand how it works, get the message out to parents,” Hiner said. “That takes time. It just takes a lot of time to do that outreach.”

The value of school choice, Hiner said, is especially hard to elucidate when someone had a great experience at a public school. The point is, she said, it’s hard to foresee when a child might need a different option.

“If you find yourself in a position, like I did, my kids were doing very well in public schools, up until fifth grade came along for my daughter, for my oldest,” Hiner said. “And all the sudden, I needed to do something else. The public schools could not offer what she needed for her education.”

It isn’t just students in poorly performing schools that may need options, Hiner said, pointing back to her own circumstances.

“This idea that only kids living in failing school districts, that they’re the only ones who may have a need for a different option, is false,” Hiner said. “That’s completely and totally false. And again, I’ll speak from private experience of my own, my kids were attending the highest performing elementary school in the state, and we had to go someplace else. So it’s not a knock on the schools. It shouldn’t be viewed as a knock on the schools, that isn’t what this is about.”

Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

EDUCATION: Two bills in Virginia could streamline credit acceptance and make college data more transparent.

By Kaitlyn Speer | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – Two bills in Virginia could streamline credit acceptance and make college data more transparent.

House Bill 1336, introduced by Delegate Steven Landes, R-Weyers Cave, calls for the State Commission on Higher Education for Virginia to develop a consistent standard for granting undergraduate course credits. The bill would not go into effect until July 2016.

“The reason for the bill is simple,” Landes said. “I have heard from parents and students that they do not understand why (Advanced Placement) course credits are not standard across the board for every college and university in Virginia.”

Students are incurring more than $130 million in added tuition costs by taking college courses they already passed in AP classes with scores of three or better, Landes said.

Landes’ bill would establish a uniform policy for granting undergraduate course credit to freshmen who have taken one or more Advanced Placement, Cambridge Advanced, College-Level Examination Program or International Baccalaureate examinations.

The measure would repeal current law, which allows governing boards at the schools to individually implement such policies.

“House Bill 1336 will provide a clear standard for AP course credits, and at the same time could help provide a cost savings to students who are able to apply these credits to a four-year Virginia degree program,” Landes said.

SCHEV says it has no estimates on how many students get caught up in conflicting credit rules and must retake courses. But the commission supports Landes’ effort.

“This gives SCHEV a chance to step back and take a look at the situation,” said Kirsten Nelson, director of communications and government relations for SCHEV.

HB 1336 passed the committee on education, 18-2, Wednesday morning.

House Bill 1980, by Delegate Tim Hugo, R-Centreville, would direct four-year public colleges to maintain a “Consumer Information” tab or link on their websites. Links would include data such as undergraduate retention and graduate rates, tuition and mandatory student fee increases, the use of student fees, postsecondary education employment and the school’s finances.

“I think what we want is to bring transparency … so the families and students can see how much they are paying and how much they have paid over the years,” Hugo said. “We’ve got good feedback. What we’re going to do is arm them with the facts so they can make good decisions and ask good questions, and force colleges to be more accountable.”

“All of the colleges and universities are on board,” said Dean Goodson, a spokesman from Hugos’s office. The bill passed the House subcommittee on higher education with a unanimous 9-0 vote. It will head to the full education committee Feb. 4.

“All of this information is available through SCHEV, but not everyone knows how to get to SCHEV or (that) it exists,” Goodson said. “(It) would help parents make a more informed decision. It’ll make it a lot easier on the consumer and on the parents. All the data already exists. It’s removing a step for parents trying to locate this information.”

“What this legislation calls for, it’s something we have and we’re happy to share it with the institutions it in any way the General Assembly wants us to,” said Kirsten Nelson, director of communications and government relations for SCHEV.

Kaitlyn Speer is a freelance writer for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau and can be reached at kspeer@watchdog.org or on twitter at @KSpeer11

LAW OF THE LAND?: Attorney General Mark Herring’s ruling on in-state tuition for illegal immigrants has yet to be challenged by the General Assembly.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — Instead of challenging Attorney General Mark Herring’s edict that illegal immigrants are entitled to in-state college tuition, self-professed conservatives at the General Assembly look for ways to reimburse the schools.

That’s how legislative sausage gets made, and why Richmond is behaving more like Washington, D.C., these days.

House Bill 1314 is a microcosm of the problem. Delegate Glenn Davis, R-Virginia Beach, wants to “reimburse each institution in an amount equal to the difference between the in-state tuition rate and out-of-state tuition rate for each student who becomes eligible.”

That may be good housekeeping, and it certainly pleases the colleges and universities. But it begs several questions:

Why should the General Assembly roll over for a controversial opinion by the attorney general?

Where is the money going to come from?

Does this set a precedent for granting immediate in-state tuition to U.S. citizens who move here from out of state? (If not, get ready for the class-action lawsuit.)

Neither Herring nor the lawmakers have answers. And no one knows how much HB 1314 could cost Virginia’s taxpayers. The fiscal “impact note” on the bill is “indeterminate.”

The State Commission on Higher Education guesstimates that 70 illegal immigrants are enrolled at Virginia’s four-year universities. The agency has no idea about the number at community colleges.

Without hard data, the state bends to the agendas of special interests.

Davis’ bill stipulates the cash will flow “in the event that (the General Assembly) amends any provision of law to increase the number of students who are eligible for in-state tuition …”

Yet that qualifier won’t save the taxpayers as long as lawmakers allow Herring’s ruling to stand.

In the absence of a court ruling, Herring’s opinion becomes binding law if the General Assembly fails to address the issue this year, said Richard Kelsey, assistant dean of the George Mason University School of Law.

“Illegal aliens are not entitled to in-state tuition under federal law unless a state offers the same opportunity to other out-of-state residents,” Kelsey said.

But legislators rejected the measure, 20-19. Democrats, as expected, were united in opposition. When Republican Sen. John Watkins of Midlothian joined them and Sen. Jill Vogel, R-Winchester, failed to vote, the Democrats and Herring prevailed.

Refusing to stand up for the constitutional separation of powers undermines the rule of law and turns Richmond into a dysfunctional, D.C.-style circus run by administrative fiat. Is it any wonder that politicians – left and right — are held in such low regard?

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

The Washington Post reported that Fannie plans to relocate and consolidate its downtown offices, even as the controversial agency faces a reorganization by Congress.

The new Class-A office space that Fannie will occupy at 15th and L streets Northwest could run more than $70 per square foot, according to data compiled by commercial broker CBRE. Comparable leases cost half that in Northern Virginia, where vacancy rates have skyrocketed.

By Fannie’s own estimates, the moving costs alone would be $160 million.

Using CBRE’s comparisons, a 15-year lease in D.C. could cost Fannie $750 million more than renting cheaper digs across the Potomac River.

Alternatively, Fannie could save hundreds of millions by using a sale-leaseback of its existing office on Wisconsin Avenue NW. A renovation-in-place also could be more economical than moving.

“They seem to be acting as if they assume the status quo is going 30 years forward. I think that is at best an uncertain assumption, and I’m not sure the taxpayers are getting full value on,” Warner said.

Committees in both the House and Senate have voted to wind down Fannie Mae.

The firm, which has received nearly $200 billion in taxpayer support, remains under federal control after being placed in conservatorship by the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

As “government-sponsored enterprises,” Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac played a pivotal role in the real-estate bust that sent Wall Street reeling in 2008.

“They funneled securities laced with high-risk mortgages into major financial institutions. When house prices … dropped in 2007, these mortgage-backed securities became unsellable and the financial crisis quickly followed,” political analyst Michael Barone wrote this month.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

Modeled after programs in Arizona and Florida, House Bill 2238 would direct roughly $4,000 per year to students who have special needs or are members of military or foster households. The $4,000 would serve as seed money to pursue private-school options.

“Many parents feel their kids are not getting the education they need. And the demand can’t be met by current funding,” LaRock told Watchdog.org in an interview.

ESA proponents contend the program would save Virginia money by leaving 10 percent of per-pupil funding allocations in state coffers, even as those students leave the public system.

Using a similar formula, Arizona estimates it will save $12.3 million annually for every 5,000 students participating. The program was implemented without opposition from teacher unions.

While Virginia has resisted school-choice initiatives and keeps a stranglehold on charter schools, LaRock figures ESAs will encounter less opposition because they do not touch local school funding — which accounts for more than half of most county government budgets.

But Steve Greenburg, president of the Fairfax County Federation of Teachers and a LaRock constituent in Loudoun County, said he hears constant concerns about the level of education funding.

“The big headline in Loudoun is that the school system doesn’t have enough money. The big complaint is that we sent more money downstate, and we don’t get it back. The district is $70 million in the hole.”

“It’s ironic and disappointing,” Greenburg said. “Pulling from big (state) pot at the top would affect everyone.”

“We have to break the cycle,” LaRock responded. “Overall education spending has tripled in last two decades — and test scores are flat or falling. We’re falling behind other countries.”

The state would maintain accountability through periodic auditing of ESAs, the Northern Virginia lawmaker said. Also, participants would have to reapply each year. Schools accepting ESA funds must be deemed “qualified.”

“We have some of the best schools in the country in Virginia, but students with special needs are often better able to succeed in a customized learning environment than within the public school system,” said LaRock, whose children are home-schooled.

He predicted that HB 2238, with 16 co-patrons in the House and three Senate sponsors, will “increase the funding per pupil in our public schools and improve educational access and opportunities for at-risk students, giving parents and students more flexibility over their education. This is a win-win.”

The bill was approved by the House Education Reform Subcommittee Tuesday, but its future was uncertain Wednesday after the full committee declined to refer it to the appropriations panel for review. The measure could be revived if a second hearing is requested, but LaRock’s office did not know if or when that might happen.

This article was updated at 12:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

To get a clearer picture there’s a web of untold detail that will take a while to untangle. To get rolling, however, Watchdog.org started at the top — the president’s office.

Last week, Watchdog.org filed requests under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act to all presidents’ offices at Virginia’s 15 public four-year universities, requesting all travel expenses for those office for the last two years, plus presidential employment agreements and amendments.

Under state law, the universities have five days to give an initial response to that request.

The state Auditor of Public Accounts office, which released the audit last week, keeps records of travel-related expenses, but unfortunately for the taxpaying public, those don’t provide item descriptions of exactly what employees purchased, or who benefited from purchases.

The state auditor’s office did, however, find disparity in the travel rules top-tier Virginia universities set. George Mason University employees, for example, are allowed to spend more than the state’s transaction limit of $5,000 on airfare, and employees at the University of Virginia are permitted to spend $500 a night for hotels at conferences.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

“We received legal counsel about past practices limit(ing) an agency’s ability to collect liquidated damages without defining a direct impact to motorists, which did not apply,” said VDOT spokeswoman Marshall Herman.

She added that the contractor, Serco, “made very clear their strong disagreement about collecting liquidated damages.”

The Inspector General’s audit, as reported by Watchdog this month, determined the VDOT could have levied $3 million in fines against Serco for failure to perform. The company provides roadside assistance, electronic signage and logistical support for VDOT as part of a $335 million contract.

Herman said that since Serco “corrected the deficiencies, no liquidated damages (fines) were applied.”

“Modifications have been made to the contract,” she added.

David Williams, president of the Alexandria, Va.-based Taxpayers Protection Alliance, called VDOT’s actions “shameful.”

“This is so frustrating. What a missed opportunity to send a clear signal that under performing contractors will be punished and a missed opportunity for taxpayers to recoup millions of dollars in fines,” he said.

Williams added that the “financial integrity of future contracts through VDOT are now at risk because of this failure to collect the fines. This will also have a chilling effect on transparency and state employees who want to report waste, fraud and abuse.”

The Inspector General’s audit was triggered by complaints to an employee whistleblower hotline. “If you’re a VDOT employee, how do you feel now?” Williams asked.

Tim Wise, president of the Arlington County Taxpayers Association, said, “If VDOT is unable to collect the liquidated damages from Serco, it seems VDOT needs to learn how to write tighter contract specifications, or VDOT and the governor’s office need to ask the General Assembly to provide state agencies with better tools for contract administration.

“Otherwise, Virginia’s taxpayers and motorists are being taken to the woodshed.”

Virginia State Sen. Chap Petersen is trying to solidify some rights for homeowners against HOAs.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — As more and more Americans live in close neighborhood quarters, there’s a new sheriff in town — your local homeowner association.

And there’s an ongoing battle in Virginia to determine just how much power that sheriff will be able to wield.

Alexandria resident Maria Farran knows that battle firsthand, from her three-year legal fight with her homeowner association in Olde Belhaven. It all started out with an Obama campaign sign that she and her husband, Sam, posted in their lawn. It was four inches taller than their covenant allowed. HOA board members threatened to put a lien on their home if they didn’t comply with the rules, and passed a resolution allowing them to fine residents up to $900 for any infraction.

“They operate as a small government with government powers,” Farran told Watchdog.org. “… They’re the judge, jury and executioner.”

Eventually, after hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees, and lots of controversy with neighbors, the courts ruled in the Farrans’ favor.

But not long after, the Virginia General Assembly, lobbied by the Community Associations Institute, nearly passed a bill that had a provision allowing homeowner associations to charge fines not laid out in their declarations. Lawmakers, under pressure, eventually nixed that part of the bill.

Sen. Chap Petersen, who fought back against last year’s legislation, is now filing a piece of his own. His bill clarifies homeowners’ rights — things like accessing the association’s fiscal records, receiving notice of board meetings in advance, and being able to cast votes on resolutions.

It’s a bill some Tea Party Patriots and some Democrats are pushing together — and a bill realtor groups are working against.

“These boards have a power, which is not even held by city councils or county boards — the power to assess and collect fines and assert a lien against property, even without a court order,” Petersen said during last year’s HOA debate debacle.

But it’s hard to say what will happen to his efforts in the Republican-dominated General Assembly.

Farran said she applauds Petersen “for at least putting something in writing.” Still, she worries because there really aren’t any repercussions for HOA boards that overstep their boundaries.

“The problem is, there are no penalties,” she said.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

]]>http://watchdog.org/194776/homeowner-association-petersen/feed/0Sex and the single delegate: Time to go, Joehttp://watchdog.org/194653/sex-joe-morrissey/
http://watchdog.org/194653/sex-joe-morrissey/#commentsThu, 22 Jan 2015 14:54:26 +0000http://watchdog.org/?p=194653

ETHICS, ANYONE?: A newly unsealed indictment puts more pressure on the General Assembly to oust Delegate Joe Morrissey.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. – From Gov. Terry McAuliffe on down, elected officials like to talk a good game about ethics. So what is to be done about Delegate Joe Morrissey?

But garnering barely 40 percent of the vote in a three-way special election this month was enough to return Morrissey to office. Each evening, he sleeps off his 6-month sex conviction in a Henrico County jail cell.

“Embarrassing” and “disgusting” don’t begin to describe this surreal scenario. As long as Morrissey’s colleagues bloviate about ethics and keep this loose cannon in their ranks, hypocrisy reigns.

Though the baby mama says she stands by her old man, lawmakers who look the other way in l’affair Morrissey are excusing their own war on women.

House Minority Leader Dave Toscano, D-Charlottesville, tried to create some political cover for his party by noting that Morrissey, who won four House races as a Democrat, is no longer a Democrat. (Imagine a Republican trying to sell that Clinton-esque rationale if the affiliations were reversed.)

House Speaker Bill Howell, R-Falmouth, says he is “in the process of assessing options.”

Pressure for action built on Wednesday when a new felony indictment became public. Authorities alleged that Morrissey submitted a forged document as evidence and lied under oath in his case.

The Richmond Free Press, an African-American weekly that serves Morrissey’s district, opined: “The first bipartisan action of the 2015 General Assembly should be to get rid of Delegate Morrissey.”

The Virginia Constitution provides legal steps for expelling a delegate. Such action hasn’t been taken since 1876, but the Free Press editorialists make a case for it now.

Morrissey’s re-election was no more convincing than his failed legal defense. Of the paltry 5 percent of Richmond-area voters who bothered to turn out for the special election, 57 percent voted against him. He didn’t even carry his own precinct. Which prompted the Free Press to suggest:

“If Delegate Morrissey isn’t going to do the right thing – and he has proven that he won’t — the House needs to help him by booting him out.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

The University of Virginia allows workers to spend up to $500 a night on hotel rooms at conferences.

It’s those sorts of anomalies that could factor into the big tab Virginia’s public universities have for travel expenses — a tab of more than $128 million in fiscal year 2013, according to the first stage of a statewide audit of all travel-related expenses for Virginia agencies and public universities.

That’s about double the bill of all other state agencies combined — $69 million.

With one of the largest student populations and a robust athletic program, Virginia Tech — officially Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University —outspent the others in travel in 2013 with a $42 million tab. That’s followed by Virginia Commonwealth University at $32 million and GMU at $12 million.

The expenses don’t exactly correlate with the size of the student population, since GMU in Fairfax has the largest student population.

State auditors said it isn’t surprising universities spend so much on travel, whether it’s for conferences or athletic teams. One of Virginia Tech’s biggest expenses was $600,000 for chartered airline services for away football games.

And travel is a pretty broad category, including things like paying the city of Blacksburg for student bus transportation around town. Still, that’s a bill that hits the pockets of students and taxpayers.

“Given the significance of university travel expenses, it is likely there are some opportunities for efficiencies through sharing best practices, and we plan to expand on this in the next phase of our review,” the state auditor’s office said.

With student tuition soaring an average of 7 percent at Virginia’s public universities this year, finding efficiencies is something to consider.

Part of the issue, the audit pointed out, is that top-tier universities — Virginia Tech, UVA, the College of William and Mary and VCU — have the autonomy to set up their own guidelines for travel policies instead of following the state’s accounting procedures. Sometimes, that leads to interesting differences, like UVA employees being able to spend $500 a night for a hotel room.

In the months ahead, state auditors say they will drill down and suggest specific ways Virginia’s 200,000-student public university system can save cash.

— Kathryn Watson is a reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

The 20-19 defeat effectively ends any legislative attempts to override Attorney General Mark Herring’s ruling that illegal immigrants are eligible for discounted in-state college tuition.

The original bill by Black, R-Sterling, declared that “absent congressional intent to the contrary, any person granted Temporary Protected Status, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or Deferred Action for Parental Accountability by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services does not have the capacity to intend to remain in Virginia indefinitely and, therefore, is ineligible for Virginia domicile and for in-state tuition charges at public institutions of higher education in the Commonwealth.”

Black told Watchdog.org on Wednesday that “special interests” continue to drive the immigration debate against the wishes and interests of citizens.

“The general public’s concerns are not considered,” he said.

Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe derided calls to reverse Herring’s ruling. Supporters of Black’s bill said it was intended to protect taxpayers, who subsidize roughly half the cost of in-state tuition.

Delegate Mark Cole, R-Spotsylvania, has introduced HB 1328 to require K-12 principals to determine the citizenship and immigration status of each enrolled student. That information is not currently collected.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

RICHMOND, Va. – They were like deer in the headlights. Or perhaps a pack of wolves prowling for a good meal.

Virginia lawmakers poured out of their morning session Monday and came face to face with activists and special-interest groups staked out on the Capitol grounds.

NOT IN THIS HOUSE: Delegate Scott A. Surovell, D-Fairfax, talks to the members Monday in the House of Delegates in Richmond, about some of the things you are not allowed to bring into the State Capitol, including flags, sirens and balloons, even though guns are allowed. The first Monday after the legislature begins is traditionally a day for both sides of the gun control issue to visit and lobby their lawmakers.

But there wasn’t a lot of face-to-face interaction during this annual gantlet called “Lobby Day.” Instead of a healthy exercise in grassroots government of and by the people, it’s a risible game of political dodge ball.

Lawmakers hustled through the assembled masses. Few stopped to share a pleasantry if they were called out by one of the citizen lobbyists, whose causes ranged from gun rights to family farming to small business. Tea partyers and the LGBT crowd were there, too. But were they represented?

As the political parade sped by, one onlooker mused, “Who are the servants and who are the masters here?”

The elected officials had other thoughts on their minds. They were headed to lunch (perhaps privately with a well-heeled professional lobbyist) or en route to committee meetings.

Though the day is designated Lobby Day, the schedule is like any other day of the 60-day session. There is precious little time to listen to people who had taken a day off work to be in Richmond.

After observing the blow-by outside the General Assembly Building, I went inside to see if the citizen lobbyists were having better luck there. Alas, most legislators were gone. Even some staffers had vacated their posts.

One Northern Virginia delegate’s reception area was abandoned, with nothing but a guest book for people to write their names. Days earlier, this lawmaker had issued a “C’mon down” invitation.

Other legislators, when recognized in the GAB’s hallways, reflexively pulled out their cell phones to make calls — real or not. Still others let the citizen lobbyists sit outside until time and patience ran out.

Lobby Day wasn’t a total bust, however. Veterans of the Capitol machinery know which levers to pull. They make appointments well in advance. They send actual constituents, who, at least theoretically, have the power to vote out their elected representative. These increase the odds of getting face time.

But such tactics offer no guarantees that an audience will be granted. Stuff happens. Schedules can conveniently change when inconvenient issues come knocking.

If the leaders of the General Assembly truly want Lobby Day to live up to its name, they would lighten the schedule and free up time for lawmakers to give a fair hearing to the citizens who pay their salaries. For one day at least.

Lawmakers could, of course, still play dodge ball and confirm the public’s cynicism about the legislative process. But that would be on them. They couldn’t duck so easily behind their busy schedules.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

BAD DEAL: Lloyd Chapman of the American Small Business League says a “test program” is failing U.S. taxpayers by stifling competition for defense contracts.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org

While government agencies snoop into the private lives of Americans, Congress maintains a stone wall around trillions of dollars in public contracts.

Just before their Christmas break, lawmakers quietly renewed the Comprehensive Subcontracting Plan Test Program, a oxymorically titled law that blocks disclosure of Pentagon spending.

The only thing “comprehensive” about the program is its blanket blockade of subcontractor data. With its latest renewal, the aging “test program” will turn 27 years old in 2017.

“It eliminates transparency and eliminates penalties” for noncompliance, said Lloyd Chapman, president of the California-based American Small Business League.

Chapman, in an interview with Watchdog.org, estimated that “taxpayers were cheated out of $2.5 trillion over the last 25 years.”

Chapman acknowledges that critics only have guesstimates because CSPTP is as dark as a black box.

“The public needs to know, but the government has not been forthcoming. A lot of money is not being reported,” said Ashok Mehan, CEO of Fedmine, a government data collection company in Maryland.

In 2004, the U.S. Government Accountability Office zeroed in on foreign subcontractors.

“Without accurate and complete information on subcontracts to firms performing outside the U.S., (the Department of Defense) cannot make informed decisions on industrial base issues,” the GAO report said.

In 2011, U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., introduced H.R. 3184 to redistribute $200 billion a year from large corporations that receive federal small-business contracts to small businesses that Chapman says are supposed to receive the money. The measure went nowhere.

Congress first approved CSPTP in 1990, ostensibly to relieve contractors of burdensome government record-keeping rules.

“I don’t know that it’s overly cumbersome,” Mehan said of the accounting requirements.

Ironically, the program’s stated objective is to “increase subcontracting opportunities for small businesses.”

“Who in their right mind could possibly believe eliminating all transparency and penalties in Pentagon small business subcontracting would ever increase subcontracting opportunities for small businesses?” Chapman asked in an op-ed article for The Hill.

This article was updated at 2:05 p.m. Jan. 22.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

WIND DRIVEN: The pullout by two major investors to the Cape Wind project in Massachusetts has raised questions about future offshore wind projects in the U.S. This view is of the wind turbines at the Donghai Bridge Offshore Wind Farm near the Donghai Bridge in Shanghai, China.

By Rob Nikolewski │ Watchdog.org

A not-so-mighty wind generated in the wake of the potential collapse of a controversial project off the cost of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, is blowing some doubt around the future of offshore wind energy in the U.S.

Without financing from its two biggest customers, the project that has drawn criticism from environmentalists as well as fiscal conservatives may not continue, even though it’s been debated for more than 13 years.

But the potential collapse of Cape Wind brings up larger questions about the ability of offshore wind energy projects to get a foothold in the U.S.

“I do think that it slows things down,” said Susan Tierney, a former assistant secretary for policy at the U.S. Department of Energy who is now a consultant in Boston and worked with Cape Wind officials. “It may give a lift to opponents who feel emboldened to keep pounding on things and it may chill some developers who might otherwise really want to do it.”

“I think offshore wind energy projects in the United States are dead for the foreseeable future,” said Tuerck, a longtime critic of the Cape Wind project. “With the declining fossil fuel prices and the demonstration by Cape Wind about how expensive offshore wind power is, I think it’s dead for the foreseeable future.”

With Cape Wind on the sidelines, it appears the most likely candidate for the first functioning offshore wind farm in the country will go to DeepWater Wind, a $225 million project off the coast of Block Island in Rhode Island.

DeepWater Wind CEO Jeffrey Grybowski told the Rhode Island’s Public Utilities Commission recently the project is on schedule and should be up and running by the end of 2016.

But some question whether the project will prove a good use of taxpayer dollars.

“As to whether this is a real project that would justify the costs of the increase in utility rates,” state Rep. Robert Craven, D-North Kingstown told WJAR-TV, “people in Rhode Island are mad about that.”

Update 1/20:Bloomberg News BNA, quoting an analyst who said “I think they feel like the handwriting is on the wall,” reported the wind industry “is lobbying for a gradual phaseout of its production tax credit as it faces the reality that an increasingly skeptical Republican-controlled Congress may choose to let the lucrative incentive remain expired.”

The tax credit is dismissed by critics as a boondoggle, but seen by supporters as crucial to keeping the wind energy industry going.

“We get a tax credit if we build a lot of wind farms,” he told an audience in Nebraska. “That’s the only reason to build them.”

“What you have to keep in mind is that without production tax credits, there is no wind power in the United States,” Beacon Hill’s Tuerck said. “It has to be subsidized anywhere around the world it’s done … It doesn’t have to be subsidized if government is willing to make ratepayers pay more for their energy but it is simply more expensive to produce energy by wind than it is by natural gas, coal or oil.”

But with environmental concerns in mind, supporters say they’re confident that offshore wind projects will happen sooner rather than later in the U.S.

“The United States has a tremendously rich offshore resource,” Tierney told Watchdog.org in a telephone interview. “Not just off the East Coast, but off the Great Lakes and parts of the West Coast … I think it’s something at some point we’re going to have to turn to.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story reported the wind energy production tax credit had been extended for one year. It had been extended through the end of 2014.

STICKY ISSUE: Rural Virginia landowners are pressing lawmakers to side with them against construction of a trans-state gas pipeline.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — A land-rights coalition wants to curb the power of Virginia’s public utilities and open company records to the Freedom of Information Act.

At the urging of the Augusta County Alliance, Sens. Emmett Hanger, R-Mount Solon, and Creigh Deeds, D-Bath, seek to repeal a 2004 state law that allows utilities to go onto private lands to conduct surveys without permission of property owners.

The issue is a volatile one, as Dominion Energy plans to run a large-gauge natural-gas pipeline across Virginia — much of it on private land.

Travis Geary, a leader in the Augusta uprising, accuses the state’s largest utility of “corporate overreach” and “flaunting eminent domain.”

“As demonstrated by Dominion’s recent lawsuits against landowners, the interests of utilities in Virginia have come to compete with the well-being of the people in an unhealthy way,” Geary said.

Jim Norvelle, director of communications for Dominion, responded:

“Natural gas companies need to talk with landowners and survey their properties to find the best possible route with the least impact to the environment, historic and cultural resources. The landowners know their properties best. Surveys would show if the property is or is not suitable for a pipeline and if a reroute is needed.”

Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s administration sides with Dominion’s plan to pipe natural gas from West Virginia to Hampton Roads and North Carolina. Unlike his Democratic Party brethren in Washington, who have opposed the Keystone XL Pipleline on the Plains, McAuliffe hails the 550-mile Virginia gas line as an economic boon for the state.

In a related move, Delegate Scott Surovell, D-Mount Vernon, wants to include “comments” on proposals filed with the State Corporations Commission, which oversees utilities. His bill is HB 2013.

Megan Rhyne said her Virginia Coalition for Open Government “generally supports efforts to include SCC under the auspices of the Freedom of Information Act. We think all state agencies should be under FOIA instead of governed by a separate statute, as is the case with the SCC right now.”

Bell said if Dominion gets the permit needed to build its $5 billion pipeline, Virginia citizens should have access to any information the company gathers when taking private land through forced sales.

Norvelle declined to comment on the FOI measures.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

Reining in the power of the federal government could be as easy — and as difficult — as convening a Convention of States.

By Kaitlyn Speer | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Reining in the power of the federal government could be as easy —and as difficult — as convening a convention of states.

Advocates say they are making headway in Virginia.

HJ 497, introduced by Delegate Scott Lingamfelter, R-Woodbridge, says it “Makes application to Congress to call a convention of the states to propose amendments to the United States Constitution to restrain the abuse of power by the federal government.” SJ 269, a companion measure sponsored by Sen. Ryan McDougle, R-Mechanicsville, is in the Senate hopper this session. McDougle chairs the Senate Republican Caucus.

Another proposal, HJ 498, patroned by Delegate Steve Landes, R-Verona, would limit the convention to one amendment.

Citizens for Self-Governance, a political organization dedicated to curbing federal spending and authority, lays out this scenario, per Article V.

Upon approval by two-thirds of state legislatures, Congress would be required to call a convention of states.

Delegates are chosen by the legislatures. Each state gets one vote.

Amendments are proposed and voted on at the convention.

Ratification occurs in the states, in a process chosen by Congress (by public vote or state legislatures), and must be passed by three-fourths of the states to become part of the U.S. Constitution.

A convention of states proposal was defeated 29-67 in the Virginia House last year. A Senate version failed to clear the Privileges and Elections Committee.

Only three states — Georgia, Florida and Alaska — have passed convention legislation, but “prospects are looking better,” said Craig DiSesa, legislative director at Middle Resolution, which is promoting the convention concept in Virginia.

“We believe it’s going to get passed in the House. We have tremendous momentum there,” DiSesa said.

The convention appears to be a harder sell in the more closely divided Senate, where Democrats are less hospitable to the cause of curbing federal spending and authority.

There’s even resistance on the right.

“This is not 1787,” notes C. Mitchell Shaw, a former field coordinator for the John Birch Society. “Given the chance to tinker with the Constitution, the politicians we deal with today would not produce something that limits the federal government.”

DiSesa said the convention of states would prescribe specific instructions to the delegates. “If they violate the rules and restrictions placed on them, it would be a felony,” he said.

While the convention of states advocates using Article V to rein in the federal government, Shaw said states already have the power to nullify unconstitutional laws.

“It’s called the Tenth Amendment,” he said.

The American Legislative Exchange Council — a free market organization of state legislators — insists a convention is needed. In a plea to the 50 state legislatures, an ALEC “handbook” declares:

“Our nation is trillions of dollars in debt without a credible plan to stop spending. The battle in Congress has escalated to a point where politics outweighs the cost of our economic future, and there is little hope our nation’s leaders will make the tough choices that need to be made in order to reign in our debt and revive our economy.”

“Fortunately, there is a solution outside of Congress,” said Rob Natelson, senior fellow in constitutional jurisprudence at the Independence Institute.

This article was updated at 10:45 a.m. Saturday.

Kaitlyn Speer is a freelance writer for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau and can be reached at kspeer@watchdog.org or on twitter at @KSpeer11

SCHOOL CHOICE: Homeschooling and religious freedom advocates are celebrating what they call a victory in Goochland County, Virginia.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Once in a while, Americans still have a say when they think their government has overstepped its authority.

The members of the Goochland County School Board on Tuesday night made it clear they heard the scores of parents and students who turned out to oppose a controversial 2013 board policy on religious exemptions. Since last year, the policy has required students age 14 and over whose families opt out of traditional public or private schooling for specific religious reasons to write the board and explain their religious beliefs.

But when parent after parent made it clear at Tuesday’s public hearing they believe the government has no right to test the sincerity of anyone’s faith, let alone a 14-year-old child’s, board members voted to reverse their policy. A finalizing vote will take place at the board’s next meeting.

Plenty of people showed up to support the policy, too. Elizabeth Nelson Lyda said the board’s first obligation is making sure kids in Goochland get an education.

“The obligation of this board is not to the parent,” she said. “The obligation of this board is to the children.”

Family advocacy groups were quick to come to the defense of parents. The Home School Legal Defense Association claims the board’s religious exemption policy requirements contradict state law. The Virginia-based Family Foundation also rallied behind families that educate their children at home, saying government shouldn’t decide what a genuine religious belief is.

“Government has no business interrogating anyone, much less kids, on the sincerity of their religious beliefs,” Family Foundation President Victoria Cobb told Watchdog.org earlier this week.

Goochland County Superintendent James Lane has said that last year, only a handful of homeschooling students claimed the religious exemption clause.

The religious exemption isn’t the traditional route most homeschooling families take, although they can. The religious exemption, once granted, gives virtually zero oversight to families and students, while a more typical home study route still requires things like standardized testing, and an instructor with at least a high school diploma.

But advocates worry more about precedent than the present, and parents expressed that even if they choose not to educate their children under the religious exemption clause, they defend others’ rights to do so.

“The board shouldn’t be getting into how sincere is your faith and does your faith merit this exemption. We as a society should never want people to have to subject their faith to a government body,” Cobb said.

— Kathryn Watson is a reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

MORE INDEPENDENCE: A new state audit revealed Virginia’s State Corporation Commission needs a more independent auditing structure.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The top internal auditor for a state agency that has a say in your electric bill might have had to choose between keeping a job and telling the honest-to-goodness truth.

The chief internal auditor of the State Corporation Commission has been reporting to the chief administrative officer, instead of directly to the agency’s three General Assembly-appointed commissioners.

The arrangement sets up a potential conflict of interest, a new audit from the Auditor of Public Accounts says.

The chief internal auditor, meant to operate as independently as possible, could have risked putting his job on the line to report any administrative failings to his boss, or the chief administrative officer could have left out embarrassing details.

“A lack of organizational independence could lead to management pressures affecting the objectivity of the commission’s chief internal auditor,” an audit from the state Auditor of Public Accounts, which regularly reviews state agencies, said. “As a result of the chief internal auditor only reporting to management, its assessments of management may appear to be influenced by this relationship.”

That needs to change, the state auditor said.

“The commission should establish a reporting line between the chief internal auditor and the commissioners for conducting risk assessments, establishing work plans, and issuing audit reports to protect the auditor’s objectivity,” the state audit noted.

The SCC commissioners told the Auditor of Public Accounts they’ve already changed.

“With regard to the finding in this audit as discussed with staff during the audit engagement, the commission has already realigned its organizational structure to include a reporting line to the commissioners for the chief internal auditor …,” the response said, without going into detail about just how much independence the internal auditor has.

One of Virginia’s six independent agencies, the SCC is also one of the most powerful. In fiscal 2013 its revenue was more than $312 million. The SCC is called independent because it has its own executive, legislative and judicial functions, and its decisions may be appealed only to the Supreme Court of Virginia.

The state audit didn’t find instances in which the lack of independent reporting led to internal auditors overlooking sketchy financial controls.

Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

“If the pay isn’t enough, they should resign and let someone else do it. Salaries should be kept low to encourage turnover,” FCTA President Arthur Purves told Watchdog.org.

County supervisors and school board members maintain that they are underpaid compared to their counterparts elsewhere.

Many school districts across the nation have unpaid board members. County school trustees in Virginia receive salaries for what purports to be part-time work. State law prohibits them from receiving pensions.

Speaking of Fairfax government and its school system, Purves said, “More than 70 percent of spending increases are for raises and the rising cost of benefits.”

Proposals to raise board salaries come amid financial challenges at both government entities.

The county, which doubled real estate taxes between 2000 and 2007, is at risk of losing its AAA bond rating. With all nine supervisors’ seats up for election this year, at least five members had talked of retirement. Those conversations have quieted amid prospects of richer compensation.

Gerald Hyland, Sharon Bulova, Catherine Hudgins, Penny Gross and Michael Frey each have served more than 20 years on the board. That tenure makes them all eligible for pensions equaling 75 percent of their salary.

Steve Greenburg, president of the Fairfax County Federation of Teachers, said he would prefer increased funding go to classrooms, but praised the school board’s work. He wasn’t so kind to the county supervisors.

“Our current county supervisor board has been incompetent and deserves only to be replaced next fall,” he told Watchdog.

The County Board will conduct a public hearing on the proposed pay raise on Jan. 27.

“The failed policies of this board have led to a 14 percent tax increase on our residents over the last three years, a commercial vacancy rate hovering at 19 percent, which is the highest in a quarter of a century, a budget shortfall surpassing $160 million this year alone … and they want to reward themselves with a pay increase?”

“I cannot support even looking at raising our salaries. Our residents don’t have the luxury of raising their salaries to pay for Board member raises.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Reach him at (571) 319-9824.

DIVERSITY RULES: The University of Virginia is among the public schools able to grant in-state tuition to illegal immigrants. But the state doesn’t know how many.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

Eight months after state Attorney General Mark Herring ruled that illegal immigrants are eligible for in-state tuition at Virginia colleges, state officials have no idea how many have enrolled.

“We have been asked that question a lot and the answer is ‘not with any certainty,’” said Kirsten Nelson, spokeswoman for the State Commission on Higher Education in Virginia.

“I can tell you that the public institutions in Virginia have reported a total of 70 students who are currently using the AG’s guidance as one of the specifications for in-state tuition. There is a long list of specifications, and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals is just one of them,” Nelson said.

Though the loose estimate of 70 was only for four-year public universities, and the commission had no DACA figures for enrollees at community colleges, Nelson said, “This is pretty much what SCHEV predicted at this stage.”

“Just because there are a lot of people who could avail themselves of this opportunity, it doesn’t mean they all want to go to college,” she said.

As Watchdog reported last week, taxpayers pick up roughly half the tab for in-state tuition at Virginia’s public colleges and universities. “Childhood arrivals” up to age 31 are eligible for DACA status.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

CONTRACTED: A state audit revealed that the Virginia Department of Transportation squandered tax dollars by failing to fine an underperforming contractor.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — A confidential audit found that the Virginia Department of Transportation wasted millions of tax dollars by failing to fine a nonperforming contractor, Watchdog.org has learned.

The Office of the State Inspector General concluded “at least $3 million” was “wasted” by VDOT management for not holding Serco Inc. accountable for allegedly incomplete or undone work.

Serco holds a $335 million contract to provide roadside assistance and other logistical service to VDOT. The six-year contract, which took effect July 1, 2013, was designed to provide more services at current costs, VDOT spokeswoman Marshall Herman said.

Last year, anonymous complaints to the State Employee Fraud, Waste and Abuse Hotline alleged Serco wasn’t fulfilling the contract.

The state’s audit substantiated one charge: VDOT failed to fine Serco for incidents of nonperformance. The auditors didn’t confirm claims that Serco’s contract was being renegotiated for additional funding, or that Serco employees were taking “excessive breaks” from work.

The confidential report — which cost $14,089 to conduct and was issued five months after its expected release date — also recommended “determining the need for corrective action against select employee(s).” No names were made public.

Herman said the “liquidated damages” (fines) portion of the contract was “established to incentivize the contractor to transition services within six months of the contract award.”

“However, Serco made very clear their strong disagreement about collecting liquidated damages at all due to diligence. On advice of legal counsel, VDOT determined to provide addition time. … We also received legal counsel about past practices that limit agency ability to collect liquidated damages without defining a direct impact to motorists, which did not apply,” Herman said.

A Dec. 30 VDOT memo, obtained by Watchdog, stated that identified deficiencies were corrected or are in the process of being fixed.

“The IG report did not find that the contract was renegotiated to provide additional funding, nor did it find that Safety Service Patrols were taking excessive breaks.

“At all times, systems and processes were in place to ensure the safety of the motoring public was never compromised. The report did not identify any ‘outstanding fines’ nor did it recommend fines,” Hill noted.

“We take performance seriously and continue to work with VDOT to improve overall contract administration with a common goal to implement enhancements that promote safety and make the Virginia transportation system ‘best in class’ for the nation.“

Watchdog reported last summer that the Georgia Department of Transportation canceled its $21 million contract with Serco after discovering a GDOT employee who helped approve the pact had secretly done side work for the company.

Kenric Ward is chief of Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

SMILE, YOU’RE ON COPS: Not really, but you probably are on camera. State lawmakers are trying to restrict the amount of time police can keep information collected by automatic license plate readers.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va.— If two Virginia lawmakers have their way, police won’t be able to indefinitely store data collected by automatic license plate readers.

Still, their compromise isn’t sitting well with everyone.

In early 2014, lawmakers were shocked to find that police departments around the state were continuing to use special cameras to randomly capture photos of people’s license plates, along with the exact geographic location and timestamp — despite an earlier opinion from then-Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli that doing so was unconstitutional.

Now, Democratic state Sen. Chap Petersen and Republican Delegate Richard Anderson are proposing legislation limiting the retention of that data to seven days. Petersen said he hopes it balances the issues of privacy and security, but permitting seven days of data retention is less than many police agencies want and more time than privacy groups want.

“I have the highest trust and respect for Virginia’s law enforcement professionals who ensure our safety, but the overwhelming sentiment of our citizens is that we restrict the collection, dissemination, and retention of data that many feel violates our centuries-old principles of personal privacy,” Anderson said in a statement. “Sen. Petersen and I are prepared to work with law enforcement and our constituents to ensure that a fair balance is achieved between liberty and safety.”

The legislation also will restrict law enforcement agencies from using any other electronic devices to collect individuals’ information without a warrant, so this is essentially a limited exception for automatic license plate reader technology, Petersen said.

“There’s basically no rule of thumb right now. It’s all over the map,” Petersen told Watchdog.org, noting the disparity in Virginia police departments’ policies on how long they keep the data.

Law enforcement agencies argue that records of a vehicle’s whereabouts can help them solve things like robberies or missing persons cases, situations that Petersen said shouldn’t require more than seven days worth of data.

But some, like the ACLU of Virginia’s Executive Director Claire Gastañaga, who has been a strong voice in the license-plate reader debate from the beginning, say seven days is still seven days too long.

“The ACLU of Virginia opposes the seven-day retention period,”Gastañaga told Watchdog.org in an email. “We believe that there is no law enforcement justification for maintaining any records that do not relate to active investigation and that any data not identified with an active investigation should be deleted at the end of an officer’s shift … There is certainly no reason to keep any passively collected data longer than the 24 hours that is the current state police policy and practice.

“In a democracy we should know more about government than they know about us,”Gastañaga said. “It is indeed ironic that the same law enforcement agencies that want to keep data about us and where we go for seven days refuse to share with the public any information about their actions or accept any civilian oversight. Transparency and accountability are essential elements of constitutional policing.”

The Virginia State Police doesn’t comment on pending legislation, said VSP spokeswoman Corrinne Geller, and the Virginia Association of Sheriffs’ Executive Director John Jones wasn’t available Wednesday to comment.

The lawmakers’ proposal won’t prevent agencies that want to impose a shorter retention period from doing that. It’s “just the max,” Petersen said.

The town of Ashland, Virginia, decided last year to not store the information as long as it wasn’t connected to an ongoing criminal investigation. Virginia State Police already delete their information after 24 hours.

“It undermines the public’s confidence in its public institutions,” Boente told reporters. “For that reason, these cases are important for us to prosecute to maintain that public confidence so they will understand that no one is above the law, not a high public official, not even the highest public official in the state. And that’s what this case was all about.”

Adam Lee, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Richmond field office, made it clear that, “no elected official, irrespective of their popularity or the power they wield, is above the law.”

Federal prosecutor Michael Dry said his team wanted to make it clear there is “only one system of justice in this country.”

Even though the former will spend about a decade less in jail than he might have, Richard Kelsey, dean of George Mason University’s law school who has followed the case closely, said that should still send a “very strong” message that will force politicians in Virginia and elsewhere to take their conduct very seriously.

“A lot of politicians out there are looking at their facts and saying, ‘Wow, that’s public corruption?’” Kelsey told Watchdog.org.

Kelsey said the U.S. attorney isn’t going to go after the “dog catcher of Saskatchewan” for impact.

“You shouldn’t pick and choose who you prosecute … but if you’re looking to send a message about politician corruption, prosecuting Bob McDonnell is going to send a much stronger message,” Kelsey said.

Virginia’s Republican Speaker of the House Bill Howell, who served as a character witness on the stand Tuesday, assured McDonnell’s lawyer, the judge and the public that the McDonnell case has “most certainly” served as a deterrent for Virginia’s lawmakers.

Still, the message Virginia lawmakers really took away remains to be seen.

While many are pushing for limiting the kinds of gifts lawmakers can receive, Kelsey has a different — and perhaps not as popular — idea, for deregulating things: let lawmakers receive any amount and number of gifts they want, so long as they’re disclosed. It’s what he calls more of a free-markets-based change to the system.

“I recognize that it’s a hard argument to make,” he said.

But then, things wouldn’t be so under-the-table, he suggested, and large gifts could be traced to see if they align with any official action.

“Then you can connect the dots far more effectively than you can now,” Kelsey said.

Republicans and Democrats alike in the Virginia General Assembly are pushing for stricter gift laws when the General Assembly convenes Jan. 14.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

GOOD TO GO: Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring ruled that illegal immigrants can get in-state tuition at the commonwealth’s public colleges and universities – a benefit not granted to American citizens who come from other states.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — Virginia is sitting out the legal fight over President Obama’s controversial amnesty order, even though illegal immigration costs Virginians more than $1.8 billion a year.

“This is the exact same conclusion then-Attorney General Bob McDonnell reached regarding immigrants with temporary protected status. Because they have been approved for (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), these students are considered ‘lawfully present’,” Kelley told Watchdog.org.

DACA students can be up to 31 years old to qualify for the tuition breaks.

To his knowledge, Kelley said the attorney general “was never asked to participate” in the 25-state lawsuit now pending in a Texas federal court. The lawsuit challenges President Obama’s order to legalize more than 4 million residents in this country illegally.

As of December 2013, approximately 8,100 people in Virginia had their DACA applications approved.

Virginia taxpayers subsidize roughly half the tuition expense for in-state residents — about $6,000 per year per student.

“We set the rules as to who is eligible, and the rates, because we appropriate the money for in-state students,” Marshall said of the Legislature.

David North, a policy analyst with the Center for Immigration Studies, questioned Herring’s decision.

“Unfortunately, such a ruling is part of a larger picture of supportive policies toward illegal aliens that simply makes it attractive to come to the U.S., legally or otherwise.

“Ruling in the other direction would simply mean that a Virginia-based illegal would be treated like a citizen of another state, and be forced to pay his or her full tuition — hardly a death sentence,” North said.

Marshall, one of the General Assembly most conservative members, said Herring’s actions — and inaction — were consistent.

“Deciding that he is a Rule of One for who can attend Virginia state universities at the in-state tuition rate, it is not surprising that he is sitting this lawsuit out regarding President Obama’s unilateral suspension of the immigration laws as applied to 4 million of the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States,” the lawmaker said.

He also noted that the General Assembly’s Republican leadership has “done nothing” to counter Herring’s tuition ruling.

ON THE FIRING LINE: As states sue the federal government, House Speaker John Boehner is feeling heat from rank and file Republicans to defund President Obama’s executive amnesty order.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org

As 25 states sue the Obama administration over the president’s controversial executive amnesty order, an immigration group is urging Congress to join the fight on behalf of taxpayers and the Constitution.

“For six years, the Obama administration has been obsessed with centralizing power but refused to use it to enforce immigration laws. Instead, they’ve focused their efforts on dismantling enforcement and shutting down states that have tried to enact bills reacting to the inaction in Washington,” said Bob Dane, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform.

“Congress must act, using both legal force and fiscal constraints,” Dane told Watchdog.org.

“The president has a constitutional obligation to ‘take care that the laws Congress writes are faithfully executed,’” he said. “There is no point in having this language in the Constitution unless Congress and the courts recognize their responsibility to hold the president accountable for obeying the law.”

Dane added: “Congress must also act to restore its power to ‘establish a uniform rule of naturalization’ under Article I, Section 8, Clause 4 of the Constitution, meaning Congress makes the laws; the president must carry them out.”

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., issued a scathing report over the weekend, declaring that less than 3 percent of illegal immigrants will ever be deported. Last week, the Congressional Research Service announced that illegal immigration began to rise in 2012 after a five-year lull.

Though House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, has soft-peddled the immigration issue, some newly elected House Republicans are spoiling for a fight — with or without their party’s current leadership.

JUST SAY NO: Dave Brat, who rode the illegal immigration issue to victory over fellow Republican Eric Cantor last year, wants Congress to defund President Obama’s executive order granting amnesty.

“When the new Republican-led Congress takes office this week, one of our first priorities must be to have a clean bill to reverse the amnesty spending by immediately restricting any federal funds from being used to carry out Mr. Obama’s illegal decree.

“There is speculation that there may only be a show vote on rescinding that money, and instead a ‘border security’ bill would be offered as a substitute for stopping amnesty. A border spending bill that doesn’t really strengthen the border and allows illegal immigrants to continue living and working in the United States would only make things worse.

“That is unacceptable,” Brat said.

A showdown over immigration comes as Texas and 24 other states sue the Obama administration over costs they are incurring over the broken southern border. Texas state troopers spent $1.3 million a week this summer dealing with the surge of Central American children, the Wall Street Journal reported.

“Mr. Obama has increased the incentives to come here illegally and encouraged people to stay in the expectation of a future executive amnesty,” the newspaper stated in an editorial.

Administration lawyers responded to the lawsuit on Christmas Eve, alleging the states are attempting to usurp the “sovereign prerogative of the federal government.”

But states say they have legitimate grievances and legal standing to fight in court. Dane estimates the states are bearing $84 billion a year in costs related to illegal immigration. The federal portion is estimated at $113 billion annually.

Dane says the Obama amnesty, which legalizes up to 5 million illegal immigrants in the country, can be challenged by the states on monetary grounds.

Federal Earned Income Tax Credits, to cite one example, will now be opened to newly legalized undocumented immigrants. About $62 billion was spent on the EITC program in 2012, with refunds averaging $3,000 per household.

The House of Representatives, which controls the federal purse strings, “has a duty to stand up for the American people when their own president decides to work against them,” Brat said. Brat and other conservative colleagues tried unsuccessfully to defund the amnesty program with an amendment to the Cromnibus spending bill Congress narrowly passed before Christmas.

“There is no doubt that what the president is doing is illegal,” Brat said. “The leadership of both parties admitted it, and even the president himself admitted it. House members must be committed to ensure an amnesty defund bill passes.”

Muzaffar Chishti, who directs the New York office of the Migration Policy Institute, said Congress could strip funding for the amnesty program from the Department of Homeland Security budget. The president would then have to decide whether to veto that action and effectively defund all DHS operations.

Chishti called the states’ lawsuit “speculative” and “tinged with politics.” Noting that immigration policy falls under federal jurisdiction, he said, “There is no precedent to indicate that the president’s action is not lawful.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

RICHMOND, Va. — After years of outpacing the nation in economic growth, Virginia is sputtering. Employment is lagging, real estate is flat and the Obama administration’s War on Coal isn’t helping.

An economic forecast released Monday shows southwest Virginia’s coal country remains below the 2011 employment peak, with Lynchburg continuing to lose jobs. Bristol has recovered about half its lost jobs and Roanoke has regained just 38 percent, according to the latest statistics.

Virginia’s biggest growth areas are projected to be in education and health care. Health-care spending is being fueled by defense contractors getting into field, lured by the injection of billions of Obamacare dollars.

Meantime, the administration’s War on Coal is stifling Virginia’s economy. Hundreds more of the state’s coal-mining jobs were lost in 2014 as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency moved to shut down coal-fired power plants.

“Ask Germany and Spain how their commitment to renewables has worked out over the past 15 years. Spain’s economy is in a shambles. Germany is shutting down most of its offshore wind program and building coal-fired power plants as fast as possible to ward off financial disaster,” according to environmental scientists Dennis Mitchell and Willie Soon.

“Shoving immature technologies down the throats of the taxpayer is outrageous,” Mitchell and Soon argue. “Energy costs from traditional sources have been artificially and substantially raised … and no one suffers more than the poor.”

“We will need to decrease our dependence on Washington and strengthen Virginia’s economy by creating a more favorable and competitive business climate,” said Matthew Moran, communications director for the Falmouth Republican.

Moran said Howell “believes the best way to do this is to keep taxes low, create a positive regulatory environment and strengthen Virginia’s workforce through education and training.”

Building permits for single-family homes tumbled 9.1 percent in 2014, and are predicted to inch up just 0.9 percent this year.

Despite a 12.2 percent decline in home prices since 2007, Virginia is no bargain these days. A Tax Foundation study showed state and local taxes make Virginia one of the 10 most expensive states in which to live.

Mike Thompson, president of the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy, which commissioned the Chmura report, said the economic forecast “shows that Virginia needs to move away from such heavy reliance on federal government spending.”

“Government policies, regulations and taxes can surely inhibit economic growth, and that is what we are seeing today,” Thompson told Watchdog.org “The correct policies can encourage growth, and we need to move in that direction quickly and creatively.”

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

EXCHANGE RATES: Premium costs for ACA-compliant plans will increase by double-digits next year. Then, taxpayers might have to bail out insurance companies too.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — In keeping with the giving Christmas spirit, federal taxpayers are pitching in $2 million for a marketing campaign to make sure Virginians eligible for government-subsidized health care know how to enroll.

The commonwealth isn’t expanding Medicaid eligibility under the Affordable Care Act, at least, not yet. Still, a federal exchange grant that runs through December 2015 will help Gov. Terry McAuliffe accomplish his mission of marketing health care options to the masses. Right now, it’s all federal funding, but the governor wants to use state funds for the cause, too.

Through radio ads, online banner ads and television ads, Big River is trying to boost the name ID of Cover Virginia, the state website that directs people to check their eligibility for health programs and subsidies on the federal exchange.

“Those materials focus on two messages for Virginians: the consumer assistance is available to help with the application process and that plans on the (federally facilitated marketplace) are affordable,” DMAS said through spokesman Craig Markva.

After state House and Senate Republicans earlier this year deflated McAuliffe’s campaign pledge to expand Medicaid to new populations, the governor announced a smattering of moderate changes to health care programs for low-income Virginians. One of those changes included leveraging state and federal funds to raise eligibility awareness with the goal of enrolling an additional 35,000 children in FAMIS, the state’s program for children, and 160,000 people in the federal health insurance marketplace.

McAuliffe said he’s hoping for up to $14 million in federal funds, but didn’t specify how much will come from state coffers.

“This outreach campaign will inform Virginians about coverage options that are already available through the federal marketplace, Medicaid and FAMIS,” McAuliffe said at the time.

On behalf of the commonwealth, Big River will launch a media campaign in late spring to enroll more eligible children in Medicaid and FAMIS. That, DMAS officials said, will be paid for with both state and federal funds.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

BACK TO BUSINESS: State lawmakers will have lots of work to do when they get back to Richmond.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Virginia lawmakers have some serious problems to tackle when they return to Richmond on Jan. 14.

With the Jan. 6 sentencing of former Gov. Bob McDonnell fresh in their minds, lawmakers will wade through proposals to tighten rules on disclosure laws, lobbying after leaving the statehouse and gift limits.

With the commonwealth still grappling with closing a $2 billion budget shortfall, lawmakers will have to take further steps to cut spending, close tax preference loopholes or raise taxes. Given the Republican majority and that 2015 is an election year for legislators, it’s pretty safe to say tax hikes are out of the question.

Plus, with renewed concerns about privacy laws and police use of surveillance and military-grade equipment in the wake of the National Security Administration scandal and the events in Ferguson, Mo., delegates and senators will need to figure out how to balance safety, privacy and liberty.

Following revelations about possible inaction in cases of suspected rape at the University of Virginia and elsewhere, Republican Sen. Richard Black has filed legislation requiring university employees to report incidents to police within 48 hours. Failing to do so would be a Class 1 misdemeanor. The proposed law doesn’t differentiate between public and private higher ed institutions. The law also doesn’t require alleged victims to make a report.

Delegate Eileen Filler-Corn has filed somewhat similar legislation, HB 1343, requiring either campus police or local law enforcement to report any sexual assault investigation on university property to the local commonwealth’s attorney within 48 hours. Filler-Corn’s bill doesn’t come with penalty strings attached.

The now-infamous Rolling Stone article that alleged a young student named “Jackie” was gang-raped at a UVA fraternity has turned out to be dubious. Still, UVA’s process of allowing “informal” resolution of alleged sexual assaults involving the alleged victim, alleged perpetrator and administrators has come under fire.

Both Delegate Peter Farrell, a Republican, and Delegate Betsy Carr, a Democrat, have filed bills to prohibit authorities from searching all electronic devices — think cell phones, laptops or tablets — without a warrant. Neither delegate’s bill is clear on what penalties would be in place for a law enforcement officer or anyone else who would violate that potential law. Their efforts are just one part of a bigger privacy push that’s bound to come in the 2015 session, with the creation of the Ben Franklin Privacy Caucus this year. The bipartisan caucus, led by Democratic Sen. Chap Petersen and Delegate Richard Anderson, is looking for ways to reform everything from the use of drones to automatic license plate readers by police.

3. Lots of proposals to change Virginia’s ethics laws

Lawmakers have already filed a smattering of bills to tighten Virginia’s ethics and disclosure laws, and more are sure to come.

Delegate Peter Farrell is trying to prohibit any lawmaker who retires from the General Assembly from taking a state agency job for at least one year.

Delegate Lionell Spruill has filed legislation to restrict the General Assembly from appointing a person to a judgeship if the person is an immediate family member of someone in the General Assembly. The bill comes after Republicans reportedly offered former Sen. Phil Puckett’s daughter a judge seat if the Democrat resigned from the Legislature.

Delegate Chap Petersen has filed a massive conflicts of interest bill, prohibiting state and local government employees from accepting any gifts over $100. Any intangible gift over $100, like airfare, would have to be approved by the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Advisory Council.

4. Requesting an Article V convention from Congress

Several Virginia delegates have filed bills that would petition Congress to call for an Article V convention under the U.S. Constitution. With dissatisfaction with Congress at an all-time high, there’s a growing movement to propose amendments to the U.S. Constitution that would rein in federal power.

The Founding Fathers made that possible through Article V, which says if two-thirds of states petition Congress for a convention of states, Congress must call for one. After a convention takes place and amendments are proposed, three-quarters of the states must ratify them to change the Constitution. Delegate Steve Landes, Delegate Scott Lingamfelter and Delegate Jim LeMunyon are all filing resolutions that, if passed, would submit such a request to Congress. They all, however, want a convention for slightly different reasons.

Virginia’s lawmakers are historically pretty tough on crime and activities with a stigma attached, so decriminalizing marijuana won’t be easy. That, however, is what Democratic state Sen. Adam Ebbin is trying to do. He’s filed legislation to decriminizalize marijuana possession and eliminate the 30-day jail sentence. But Ebbin still wants a small fine — a maximum $100 civil penalty fine, instead of the current $500 criminal fine. The bill also allows a person to grow up to six plants, so long as they’re for personal use.

There’s a little quirk in Ebbin’s proposal. It would only be illegal for an adult to distribute marijuana paraphernalia to a minor at least three years his junior.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

This is the fifth installment in our countdown of the 17 Good Guys of 2014, people whose commitment to small and responsive government have made life better for everyone. Please enjoy their stories.

#3 Virginia farmers

The best people of Virginia are grounded in reality. Literally.

BONETA: Among those Virginia farmers leading the charge against onerous government regulations.

Martha Boneta, Bernadette Barber, Lois Smith and a host of other small Virginia farmers are leading a fight for personal liberty against onerous regulations that eliminate food choices.

These three unsung heroines are part of the resistance against the Gestapo-like tactics employed by environmental poseurs, local politicians, state regulators and even the powerful Virginia Farm Bureau trying to curb entrepreneurship.

Boneta, of Fauquier County, helped convince the state Legislature to expand Virginia’s Right to Farm law, blocking local officials from dictating what farmers can do with their land and opening new fields to small-scale agriculture and improved nutrition.

Boneta, Barber and Smith are working to make small-scale agriculture sustainable, the way this nation’s founders envisioned it, without kowtowing to the political or corporate establishment.

It’s fitting three women from the home state of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and James Monroe, et al, are at the forefront of a 21st century agrarian renaissance.

–Kenric Ward, Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau–

#4 Eric O’Keefe

Eric O’Keefe risked his personal liberty standing up against Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm and his secret John Doe probe of aides, allies and friends of Republican Gov. Scott Walker.

O’Keefe’s conservative advocacy group Wisconsin Club for Growth was among 29 conservative organizations, some of whose members’ homeswere raided, paramilitary-style before dawn.

Conservative activist Eric O’Keefe took the offensive in a John Doe probe run amok.

Tired of Chisholm’s seemingly endless investigations, O’Keefe took on the prosecutors. State and federal judges agreed prosecutors had failed to prove probable cause that the conservative groups had committed alleged campaign finance crimes.

Finally, O’Keefe is suing the Government Accountability Board, the state’s regulator of campaign finance and election law on charges of cobbling together a “Frankenstein’s monster” of laws and rules to justify an attack on First Amendment rights.

O’Keefe’s stand took the secret John Doe probe out of the shadows for the public. Without him, silence would have been enforced, the prosecutors’ secrets might never have been exposed and First Amendment speech rights would remain in peril.

–M.D. Kittle – Wisconsin Reporter–

#5 Mike Foley

In January, Mike Foley becomes lieutenant governor of Nebraska. Privately, many people will be celebrating his departure as state auditor.

WASTE-BUSTER: State Auditor Mike Foley has found plenty of it in Nebraska

For the past eight years, Foley tore through budgets all across the state looking for waste, fraud and corruption — and had no trouble finding it. He found state employees making what appeared to be fake trips, put legal guardians in jail for plundering their wards’ bank accounts and energy assistance checks being sent to dead people.

And in Nebraska, where you can’t swing a donkey without hitting an elephant, he routinely found issues in the offices run by his fellow Republicans. The secretary of state was dinged for not competitively bidding out contracts, the state Supreme Court for going over budget and improper travel and the university system for breaking the law by turning over health records.

Sometimes, Foley would announce his more shocking findings in press conferences, which did not endear him to the targets of his investigations.

Foley’s new boss, incoming Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts, has promised to help Foley clean up some of the messes he uncovered. We hope Ricketts keeps his promise.

–Deena Winter, Watchdog.org Nebraska Bureau–

#6 Cynthia Browning

Vermont Rep. Cynthia Browning sued the leader of her own party after Gov. Peter Shumlin defied an Act 48 requirement that he disclose financing plans for single-payer health care.

Shumlin cleverly chose not to specify financing for a single-payer health plan when Act 48 became law in 2011, Browning told Vermont Watchdog. “If he had,” she said, “that bill would not have passed.”

–Bruce Parker, Watchdog.org Vermont Bureau–

#7 John Whitehead

John Whitehead and his Rutherford Institute have since 1996 intervened to protect religious freedom here, taken on human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia, and — gasp! — fought for the sanctity of human life everywhere.

HITTING THE CENTER OF THE TARGET: Whitehead’s Rutherford Institute fights for human rights and freedoms.

Whitehead went stronger than ever in 2014.

Whitehead, an attorney based in Charlottesville, Va., was one of the first to blow the whistle on invasive use of drones. Recently, he helped free a veteran who was arrested for posting “dangerous” opinions on Facebook.

Where partisan agendas paralyze the ACLU, the Rutherford Institute stays true to the fundamental principle that government overreach puts a chokehold on individual liberty.

Whitehead’s 2013 book — “A Government of Wolves” — paints a grim portrait of a nation in the final stages of transformation into a police state.

As he says, “Anytime people find themselves under fire from both the liberal left and the conservative right, it means that that person is probably right on target.”

–Kenric Ward, Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau–

#8 Eric Epstein and Gene Stilp

This past year, Eric Epstein and Gene Stilp handed out fake bribes to Pennsylvania lawmakers, used Halloween props to mock a “ghost employee” in the governor’s office and set off a quacking ringtone while the General Assembly discussed the state’s $153 million reserve fund.

HEROIC JESTERS: Political pranksters Gene Stilp and Eric Epstein have a serious message behind the comedy.

The two political pranksters — some inside the Capitol would say self-appointed reformers — got under the skins of lawmakers. Those legislators, on the other hand, give Stilp and Epstein plenty to work with.

Longtime supporters of a ban on gifts to lawmakers, the pair delivered fake bribes, $1,000 bills with Gov. Tom Corbett’s picture on them that read “IN GRAFT WE TRUST,” to their offices. No gift ban was passed.

“You’re dealing with a Legislature that couldn’t pass gas at a frat party,” Epstein said then.

After public officials were caught sending X-rated emails, the pair set up a post office box soliciting anonymous tips about other misuse of government computers.

Stilp, a perennial candidate for public office, also hilariously hijacked a natural gas rally and practically worked a part-time job filling out ethics complaints.

“No one is looking out for citizens, nobody,” Rosenquist said. “None of the agencies, none of the regulatory bodies. Absolutely nobody is looking out for the interests of consumers, landowners, residents and ordinary citizens.

Rosenquist, a consultant who owns a hobby farm with her husband, Bob, is as knowledgeable as any high priced energy attorney but she volunteers her time.

In 2010, she opposed billionaire T. Boone Pickens’ Texas-size industrial wind turbine proposal for southeastern Minnesota farm country with a billboard —“Pickens Gets the Gold Mine, We get the Shaft.” Pickens pulled out and the $180 million project is now dead in her back yard.

Google “Rosenquist” today, and 425,000 mentions pop up, give or take. This past year alone, Rosenquist advised wind development opponents in her home state as well as Alabama, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

–Tom Steward, Watchdog.org Minnesota Bureau–

#10 Jonathan Gruber

What? Jonathan Gruber, the best person of the year?

Surely not the MIT economist and Obamacare architect who called American voters stupid and admitted a lack of transparency was necessary to get Obamacare passed.

Well, yes, he is.

GRUBER A GOOD GUY? In an oddly honest way.

Public officials are not supposed to say the things Gruber did in a series of videos that came to light during the second half of the year. No matter what they might think, they are supposed to stick to the talking points, assure everything is being done in the best interest of the country, the poor, the oppressed and let’s not forget, the children.

Gruber’s greatest accomplishment is not helping write one of the most complicated, unpopular pieces of legislation in the nation’s history. Or that he collected six-figure consulting fees from several states while duping them with his projections.

It’s that he told everyone, proudly and honestly, how big things actually get done in Washington.

Even if he didn’t mean to.

–Eric Boehm, Watchdog.org Washington Bureau–

#11 Wayne Stenehjem

OPEN GOVERNMENT DEFENDER: Few attorneys general in the country are as committed to government transparency as Stenehjem.

“Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.”

Thomas Jefferson wrote that in 1789, and it holds true today. North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem is one of Jefferson’s modern day defenders.

Stenehjem’s office has worked hard to enforce North Dakota’s very strong open records laws that apply broadly to all aspects of government. Good laws only work when we have public officials like Stenehjem willing to enforce them.

He has helped keep open records process accessible to the general public, and has been unwilling to accept technicalities or excuses from public officials for not following those laws. In doing so, he has set a strong precedent for enforcing the state’s transparency laws for future leaders.

North Dakota is a more open state, with better governance, because of Stenehjem’s work.

When he first got to Harrisburg, newly elected State Sen. Scott Wagner couldn’t help but notice a few of the portraits of former state lawmakers hanging in the hallway of the Pennsylvania Capitol.

Alongside portraits of lawmakers who served with honor were four who had been convicted of crimes. Nobody seemed to care much about it until Wagner, R-York, introduced a resolution condemning the practice of hanging portraits of dishonored lawmakers.

Scott Wagner

The portraits didn’t come down, but not long after plaques were affixed to those four portraits chronicling their misdeeds.

Wagner’s penchant for speaking bluntly — he compared union leaders to power-hungry dictators like Hitler — has been criticized. The criticism is unlikely to silence him.

–Andrew Staub, PA Independent —

#14 Bloggers in the Heitman case

Susie Taylor

Kristy Herron, Susie Taylor and Andrew Howe used their blogs to raise questions establishment media didn’t about the death of an Oak Ridge School District employee.

Traditional media initially didn’t do much investigating in the case. Just last month, the same coroner who ruled that Alex Heitman committed suicide in 2011 recently lost his job due to allegedly tampering with a dead body.

Heitman’s family said that before his death he had discovered taxpayer money had been used to buy methamphetamine.

A growing number of people in Oak Ridge now believe Heitman didn’t take his own life and two area newspapers eventually had to re-examine the case.

Kristy Herron

Herron, Taylor and Howe say traditional media avoid bringing negative attention to their communities. Blogging, they contend, is necessary for communities to stay informed and offers the opportunity for candid discussion of community problems.

–Chris Butler, Tennessee Watchdog.org–

#15 The Confidential Source

One of our best people for 2014 is the Confidential Source.

That means Watchdog really can’t name this best person of the year. It’s confidential — and we’ve agreed to keep the identities secret. But you know who you are.

You make many of our investigative reports possible. We appreciate your tips, information, observations, complaints and concerns. Sometimes

FRIENDS IN THE SHADOWS: Here at Watchdog.org, the confidential source is vital to our work.

your emails and calls turn into great stories, sometimes not. Yet they are always deeply appreciated.

Along with gratitude and praise, here are a few tips of our own:

We like records and hard evidence. The more, the merrier. Since we can’t name you as a source, we must find other ways to prove the story is true.

There are conspiracies in the world, but we’re not part of them. When we tell you that your identity will be kept confidential, you can trust us. Our professional reputation is at stake.

Some of you prefer to be anonymous as well as confidential. However, there are times we really need to ask you questions about the information you’ve sent our way. Sometimes we must drop otherwise promising stories because we can’t verify details.

But despite headwinds from two governors and the Secretary of Energy, Brandon Presley, commissioner for the Public Service Commission’s Northern District, has remained steady and straight.

Presley is one of the few elected officials in the state to decry the oft-delayed “clean coal” Kemper Project power plant. When the other two members of his commission voted to allow Mississippi Power to continue work on the plant, he was Dr. No.

A plant that was supposed to cost $2.8 billion now has a price tag of $6.1 billion and counting, making it one of the most expensive power plants per kilowatt hour in U.S. history. Construction, already a year behind schedule, has cost Mississippi Power ratepayers millions of dollars in increased power rates.

Presley, a Democrat and the former mayor of Nettleton, has gotten PSC opinion to blow in his direction. Earlier this year, the PSC told Mississippi Power until the plant is proven to be in commercial operation it will not hold hearings to decide whether Mississippi Power or ratepayers will pay for building Kemper.

In a year of videotaped beheadings, school shootings, Russian invasions and annexations of eastern Ukraine (or, as Valdimir Putin calls them, staycations), Ebola, deadly Mexican cops, deadly American cops, Bashar al-Assad’s readiness to kill his Syrian fellows, Kim Jong Un’s funny/creepy hack of Sony Pictures, the release of those emails revealing that (a) Sony Pictures executives are closet racists and (b) (when they pulled the offending comedy film that irritated KJU) public cowards — in a year like this one, we’re saying, it’s easy to overlook the myriad outrageous acts of your local government bureaucrats. We’re not saying all those in government service are evil, nor even many of them. But they’re out there, the bad or merely incompetent. Watchdog.org’s national network of reporters find them. Every day, we produce investigative stories that reveal what Hannah Arendt famously called “the banality of evil” — the little ways in which otherwise average bureaucrats and others participate in acts that range from merely annoying or petty to downright homicidal.

Every day until year’s end, we’ll reveal more of the worst people we’ve encountered. Today, Nos. 9-20.

At a time when the saccharine of holiday spirit may sometimes overwhelm you, we offer this pause, this respite, this refreshment: Watchdog’s incomplete guide to some of our least-favorite fellow Americans. —The Editors

ROTHMAN: More politically than mathematically sound.

9. MINNESOTA: Mike Rothman

Rothman may hold one of the more obscure cabinet positions in state government, but the Minnesota Commerce commissioner managed to make a name for himself anyway this year – for all the wrong reasons. A longtime Democratic insider, Rothman stayed under the radar — previously no challenge for him — until his 15 minutes of fame popped up in his boss’s re-election campaign. Under heavy political pressure to disclose rate hikes for Minnesota’s state health exchange premiums before Election Day, Gov. Mark Dayton assigned Rothman the tricky task of doing the math. Rothman did not disappoint, claiming the average Obamacare premium would rise a mere 4.5 percent. Turns out Rothman’s calculations were more politically, than mathematically, sound. Actuaries figured the premium hike at closer to 12 percent. It also emerged that Rothman may have twisted health care execs’ arms to dock their rates in the first place. But mission accomplished. The media touted Rothman’s misleading math statewide, as Dayton cruised to re-election. Rothman’s fairy-tale ending didn’t last long. Reports surfaced that the commish allegedly allowed politics to trump staff recommendations to pull funding on a nonprofit accused of misspending hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer funds. Rothman’s latest calculation may be his last as a bureaucrat. MITIGATING FACTOR: He joined Dayton in requesting the state legislative auditor investigate his actions. —Tom Steward

BRESCINI: The epitome of the arrogant university administrator.

10. NORTH DAKOTA: Dean Bresciani

It’s not hard to find bad guys in academia, but it’s possible that the epitome of the arrogant, spendthrift higher-ed administrator is North Dakota State University President Dean Bresciani. In 2011 Bresciani accused lawmakers of making “eviscerating cuts” in his budget, comparing the state’s universities to “starving children.” In fact, the state has led the nation’s public universities in rising funding and increased spending by more than 38 percent from 2008 to 2014. Even as Bresciani has complained about funding shortages, he’s taken to living like a pharaoh. Bresciani traveled to Bismarck to complain to the Legislature about those alleged spending cuts in a private airplane that cost the university more than $300,000 per year to operate. During the 2013 session lawmakers passed a bill ordering the sale of the airplane, but that hasn’t put a dent in Bresciani’s lavish lifestyle. During the organizational session for the 2014 session, Bresciani showed up with his personal chauffeur/bodyguard who collects an $81,000 per year salary from the university. Meanwhile, student loan debt at NDSU has grown 125 percent over the last decade. May we recommend that the president enroll in NDSU’s COMM 485, “Crisis Communication in Public Relations”? —Rob Port

SMILE, YOU’RE ON COPS

11. VIRGINIA: Police spies

They’re watching me, and they’re probably watching you. A Watchdog.org investigation into the use of automatic license plate readers by Virginia police departments revealed some unsettling realities. The state’s former attorney general had already ruled that randomly photographing and storing license plate information without a warrant is illegal, after Virginia State Police were captured capturing photos of plates at political rallies. That didn’t stop police departments. When I requested records of my license plate under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act from the Alexandria Police Department, the police turned over 16 photos of my car at night — on the way to Bible study and parked in the private lot of her apartment complex. Police departments all over the commonwealth and even all over the country are doing the same thing. As a police officer drives, cameras on the car randomly capture and store coordinates and time stamps of citizens’ vehicles, keeping the records for months, years, or indefinitely. They say it’s a great tool for catching the bad guys, but as my case proves, it’s pretty good at catching the good guys, too — one weapon in an arsenal that includes mine-resistant tanks, courtesy of surplus equipment from the military.—Kathryn Watson

12. PENNSYLVANIA: LeAnna Washington

WASHINGTON: “I am the f–– senator. I do what I f–– want.”

For eight years, former state Sen. LeAnna Washington had her own taxpayer-funded party-planning committee. The good times ended this year when a grand jury accused the Philadelphia Democrat of using her office for political and financial gain and Attorney General Kathleen Kane charged her with theft of services and conflict of interest. According to the grand jury, Washington used her Senate staff to plan her birthday gala, which doubled as a political fundraiser. That cost taxpayers upward of $100,000, according to the indictment. The grand jury report portrayed Washington as an iron-fisted boss, evident in her reaction to a staffer who confronted her about the campaign work. “I am the f—— senator, I do what the f— I want, how I want, and ain’t nobody going to change me. I have been doing it like this for 17 years. So stop trying to change me,” Washington allegedly told him. Washington later cut the staffer’s pay and eventually fired him, according to a grand jury report. He then provided information to law enforcement, helping lead to the charges that resulted in Washington’s resignation. She accepted a plea agreement that gave her house arrest but kept her pension intact. —Andrew Staub

Shumlin: Hired Jonathan Gruber, “helped” a neighbor.

13. VERMONT: Gov. Peter Shumlin

A gubernatorial term that began with a governor taking advantage of a mentally challenged neighbor couldn’t end well. When Vermonters learned that Gov. Peter Shumlin hustled Jeremy Dodge — a stammering food-stamp recipient with severe speech and comprehension issues — out of his home and property, they knew they were dealing with a bad apple. Shumlin, aware Dodge was facing a tax sale on a $233,000 property bequeathed by his deceased parents, “helped” the indigent neighbor by buying his home — for just $58,000. After a massive public backlash, Shumlin sheepishly backed out. Since that debacle, Vermont’s governor has proceeded to conceal the exorbitant costs of single-payer health care while claiming he would not raise taxes on “hard-working Vermonters.” With the election now behind him, Shumlin has announced plans to raise property taxes. Had the governor not abandoned single-payer this month, Vermonters would have had to shoulder impossibly high payroll and income taxes. The single-payer train wreck took a bizarre turn in July when Shumlin hired Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber to crunch numbers for Green Mountain Care. By November, Gruber had become a national villain for admitting he devised health care policies in a “tortured way” to take advantage of “the stupidity of the American voter.” Gruber’s prior work for states like Colorado show his forecasts are no more reliable than the predictions of local weathermen. Fortunately for Vermonters, the death of single-payer means taxpayers’ wallets are safe once again — at least this holiday season. —Bruce Parker

Kasich was elected in 2010 as an anti-Obamacare crusader for limited government, decided in 2013 he could be a quantum politician, simultaneously against Obamacare and for the law’s expansion of Medicaid to able-bodied, working-age adults with no dependents. He captured the hearts of Ohio’s legacy press by asserting every vulnerable demographic in the state would benefit from his Obamacare expansion — and he didn’t need to convince the Ohio Republican Party, because he stacked party leadership with loyalists a year earlier. Kasich circumvented Ohio’s Republican-led Legislature to expand Medicaid, and defends the policy by lying about its funding and insisting Christ compels him. After a landslide reelection win against a Democrat whose campaign redefined the word “disaster,” Kasich is now basking in the sort of soft-focus spotlight the D.C. press reserves for Republicans who grow government using rhetoric that makes future reform even more difficult. MITIGATING FACTOR: If Kasich runs for president, count on his thin skin and quick temper to betray him at the first sign of an effective critique from a primary opponent. —Jason Hart

When it comes to abuse of power, sometimes it takes an agency. Such is the case with the “nonpartisan” Government Accountability Board, Wisconsin’s regulator of campaign finance and election law. The GAB – including the six retired judges who lead it and the 34 staff members who serve it – is embroiled in several lawsuits, one alleging the agency abused its authority and sent the bill to taxpayers. The state lawsuit charges that the GAB’s use of a secret John Doe investigation created a “Frankenstein’s monster” of stitched-together administrative rules and laws. And this monster was unleashed on dozens of conservative organizations on suspicion of campaign finance violations. Two judges have rejected the GAB’s legal theory. Attorneys for the plaintiffs suspect the GAB may have altered documents related to its special investigators. The allegation is that the agency may have attempted to hide its tracks, but got caught in the process of legal discovery. The lawsuit against the GAB described the agency’s alleged abuses as “terrible to behold” and called the “monster” a “creature that covertly collects sensitive information on political activities that do not — and cannot — constitute a crime, all while maintaining a nearly impenetrable shield of secrecy.” That’s scary. MITIGATING FACTOR: The GAB’s “labyrinthian” campaign finance rules are so contrary to the First Amendment that they made easy work for a federal appeals court in ruling that the rules are unconstitutional. —M.D. Kittle

SAWANT: “Maybe we don’t need this economy.”

17. WASHINGTON: Kshama Sawant

Virtually unknown a few years ago, this self-declared socialist led the campaign to raise Seattle’s minimum wage to $15 an hour this year, and leveraged that victory — and a proposed “millionaire’s tax,” “transit justice,” the nationalization of major corporations (including Microsoft, Boeing, and Amazon.com), and rent control — into a successful run for City Council. When confronted with evidence that raising the minimum wage would kill jobs for the very people Sawant claims she wants to help – minorities and young people – she responded with a kind of inside-the-box idealism: “If making sure that workers get out of poverty would severely impact the economy, then maybe we don’t need this economy,” she told New Yorker magazine. Karl and Che would be so proud. In her most recent proposal to spend other people’s money, she’s demanding taxpayers fork over $100,000 to install public internet in Seattle’s tent cities, raising electric rates on business, and blasting her colleagues for not spending enough on welfare programs. MITIGATING FACTOR: She’s led protests against police brutality in the wake of controversial killings by police in New York and Missouri. —Dustin Hurst

Does it get any scarier than President Chris Christie? In a meeting with potential supporters of a 2016 run for the White House, Christie was asked how he would deal with Russia’s Valdimir Putin. Comparing himself to Barack Obama, Christie said, Putin would know better than to mess with the New Jersey governor: “I don’t believe that given who I am, he would make the same judgment,” he said, mixing naivety with bluster. There’s a big difference between radioactive mushroom clouds in the sky and mushrooms on the governor’s pizzas. In the Garden State, the governor’s embarrassing double-standards are pretty obvious. Despite vowing to fix the public employee retirement system, Christie hired double-dippers while the state’s deficit grew to $170 billion. After promising transparency in government, he is playing hide-and-seek with his travel records. And his administration says nothing and hides much about a criminal investigation that implicated Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, his running mate and second-in-command. Nationally, Christie remains a strong contender for the GOP nomination, voters fascinated by his tough talk and bombastic persona – just as TV audiences are drawn to Tony Soprano, “Jersey Shore” and “The Real Housewives of New Jersey.” —Mark Lagerkvist

COLLINS: Ebola scare? Blame the Republicans.

20. NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH: Francis Collins

During the Great Ebola Scare of 2014, when it seemed his agency had mishandled the first Ebola case in the U.S., the director of the National Institutes for Health did what anyone at the top of a federal bureaucracy would do: he blamed someone else. Speaking to the Huffington Post, Francis Collins said congressional budget cuts were to blame for the lack of an Ebola vaccine and the NIH’s ham-fisted response to the disease. He said the agency would “probably” have developed a vaccine by now if it hadn’t seen a “10-year slide” in support for research. Except the facts didn’t exactly back him up. Yes, the NIH had been mostly flat-funded since 2004 — if “flat” isn’t an increase, it’s also not a slide — but the agency’s budget has increased by 900 percent since 1970, and topped $30 billion this year. It’s really a question of priorities. And what have been higher priorities for the NIH over the past few years? How about studies that included feeding cocaine to Japanese quail, finding out why lesbians are fat and getting monkeys sexually aroused. MITIGATING FACTOR: Ebola wasn’t as big a deal as some in the media made it seemed, and has already mostly been forgotten here. So the NIH is free to continue blowing money on comic stuff with no real repercussions. —Eric Boehm

Shumlin cleverly chose not to specify financing for a single-payer health plan when Act 48 became law in 2011, Browning told Vermont Watchdog. “If he had,” she said, “that bill would not have passed.”

–Bruce Parker, Watchdog.org Vermont Bureau–

#7 John Whitehead

John Whitehead and his Rutherford Institute have since 1996 intervened to protect religious freedom here, taken on human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia, and — gasp! — fought for the sanctity of human life everywhere.

HITTING THE CENTER OF THE TARGET: Whitehead’s Rutherford Institute fights for human rights and freedoms.

Whitehead went stronger than ever in 2014.

Whitehead, an attorney based in Charlottesville, Va., was one of the first to blow the whistle on invasive use of drones. Recently, he helped free a veteran who was arrested for posting “dangerous” opinions on Facebook.

Where partisan agendas paralyze the ACLU, the Rutherford Institute stays true to the fundamental principle that government overreach puts a chokehold on individual liberty.

Whitehead’s 2013 book — “A Government of Wolves” — paints a grim portrait of a nation in the final stages of transformation into a police state.

As he says, “Anytime people find themselves under fire from both the liberal left and the conservative right, it means that that person is probably right on target.”

–Kenric Ward, Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau–

#8 Eric Epstein and Gene Stilp

This past year, Eric Epstein and Gene Stilp handed out fake bribes to Pennsylvania lawmakers, used Halloween props to mock a “ghost employee” in the governor’s office and set off a quacking ringtone while the General Assembly discussed the state’s $153 million reserve fund.

HEROIC JESTERS: Political pranksters Gene Stilp and Eric Epstein have a serious message behind the comedy.

The two political pranksters — some inside the Capitol would say self-appointed reformers — got under the skins of lawmakers. Those legislators, on the other hand, give Stilp and Epstein plenty to work with.

Longtime supporters of a ban on gifts to lawmakers, the pair delivered fake bribes, $1,000 bills with Gov. Tom Corbett’s picture on them that read “IN GRAFT WE TRUST,” to their offices. No gift ban was passed.

“You’re dealing with a Legislature that couldn’t pass gas at a frat party,” Epstein said then.

After public officials were caught sending X-rated emails, the pair set up a post office box soliciting anonymous tips about other misuse of government computers.

Stilp, a perennial candidate for public office, also hilariously hijacked a natural gas rally and practically worked a part-time job filling out ethics complaints.

“No one is looking out for citizens, nobody,” Rosenquist said. “None of the agencies, none of the regulatory bodies. Absolutely nobody is looking out for the interests of consumers, landowners, residents and ordinary citizens.

Rosenquist, a consultant who owns a hobby farm with her husband, Bob, is as knowledgeable as any high priced energy attorney but she volunteers her time.

In 2010, she opposed billionaire T. Boone Pickens’ Texas-size industrial wind turbine proposal for southeastern Minnesota farm country with a billboard —“Pickens Gets the Gold Mine, We get the Shaft.” Pickens pulled out and the $180 million project is now dead in her back yard.

Google “Rosenquist” today, and 425,000 mentions pop up, give or take. This past year alone, Rosenquist advised wind development opponents in her home state as well as Alabama, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

–Tom Steward, Watchdog.org Minnesota Bureau–

#10 Jonathan Gruber

What? Jonathan Gruber, the best person of the year?

Surely not the MIT economist and Obamacare architect who called American voters stupid and admitted a lack of transparency was necessary to get Obamacare passed.

Well, yes, he is.

GRUBER A GOOD GUY? In an oddly honest way.

Public officials are not supposed to say the things Gruber did in a series of videos that came to light during the second half of the year. No matter what they might think, they are supposed to stick to the talking points, assure everything is being done in the best interest of the country, the poor, the oppressed and let’s not forget, the children.

Gruber’s greatest accomplishment is not helping write one of the most complicated, unpopular pieces of legislation in the nation’s history. Or that he collected six-figure consulting fees from several states while duping them with his projections.

It’s that he told everyone, proudly and honestly, how big things actually get done in Washington.

Even if he didn’t mean to.

–Eric Boehm, Watchdog.org Washington Bureau–

#11 Wayne Stenehjem

OPEN GOVERNMENT DEFENDER: Few attorneys general in the country are as committed to government transparency as Stenehjem.

“Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.”

Thomas Jefferson wrote that in 1789, and it holds true today. North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem is one of Jefferson’s modern day defenders.

Stenehjem’s office has worked hard to enforce North Dakota’s very strong open records laws that apply broadly to all aspects of government. Good laws only work when we have public officials like Stenehjem willing to enforce them.

He has helped keep open records process accessible to the general public, and has been unwilling to accept technicalities or excuses from public officials for not following those laws. In doing so, he has set a strong precedent for enforcing the state’s transparency laws for future leaders.

North Dakota is a more open state, with better governance, because of Stenehjem’s work.

When he first got to Harrisburg, newly elected State Sen. Scott Wagner couldn’t help but notice a few of the portraits of former state lawmakers hanging in the hallway of the Pennsylvania Capitol.

Alongside portraits of lawmakers who served with honor were four who had been convicted of crimes. Nobody seemed to care much about it until Wagner, R-York, introduced a resolution condemning the practice of hanging portraits of dishonored lawmakers.

Scott Wagner

The portraits didn’t come down, but not long after plaques were affixed to those four portraits chronicling their misdeeds.

Wagner’s penchant for speaking bluntly — he compared union leaders to power-hungry dictators like Hitler — has been criticized. The criticism is unlikely to silence him.

–Andrew Staub, PA Independent —

#14 Bloggers in the Heitman case

Susie Taylor

Kristy Herron, Susie Taylor and Andrew Howe used their blogs to raise questions establishment media didn’t about the death of an Oak Ridge School District employee.

Traditional media initially didn’t do much investigating in the case. Just last month, the same coroner who ruled that Alex Heitman committed suicide in 2011 recently lost his job due to allegedly tampering with a dead body.

Heitman’s family said that before his death he had discovered taxpayer money had been used to buy methamphetamine.

A growing number of people in Oak Ridge now believe Heitman didn’t take his own life and two area newspapers eventually had to re-examine the case.

Kristy Herron

Herron, Taylor and Howe say traditional media avoid bringing negative attention to their communities. Blogging, they contend, is necessary for communities to stay informed and offers the opportunity for candid discussion of community problems.

–Chris Butler, Tennessee Watchdog.org–

#15 The Confidential Source

One of our best people for 2014 is the Confidential Source.

That means Watchdog really can’t name this best person of the year. It’s confidential — and we’ve agreed to keep the identities secret. But you know who you are.

You make many of our investigative reports possible. We appreciate your tips, information, observations, complaints and concerns. Sometimes

FRIENDS IN THE SHADOWS: Here at Watchdog.org, the confidential source is vital to our work.

your emails and calls turn into great stories, sometimes not. Yet they are always deeply appreciated.

Along with gratitude and praise, here are a few tips of our own:

We like records and hard evidence. The more, the merrier. Since we can’t name you as a source, we must find other ways to prove the story is true.

There are conspiracies in the world, but we’re not part of them. When we tell you that your identity will be kept confidential, you can trust us. Our professional reputation is at stake.

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But despite headwinds from two governors and the Secretary of Energy, Brandon Presley, commissioner for the Public Service Commission’s Northern District, has remained steady and straight.

Presley is one of the few elected officials in the state to decry the oft-delayed “clean coal” Kemper Project power plant. When the other two members of his commission voted to allow Mississippi Power to continue work on the plant, he was Dr. No.

A plant that was supposed to cost $2.8 billion now has a price tag of $6.1 billion and counting, making it one of the most expensive power plants per kilowatt hour in U.S. history. Construction, already a year behind schedule, has cost Mississippi Power ratepayers millions of dollars in increased power rates.

Presley, a Democrat and the former mayor of Nettleton, has gotten PSC opinion to blow in his direction. Earlier this year, the PSC told Mississippi Power until the plant is proven to be in commercial operation it will not hold hearings to decide whether Mississippi Power or ratepayers will pay for building Kemper.

A similar reform was offered at the 2014 session by Delegate Ben Cline, R-Lexington. After it failed to pass, Delegate Richard Morris, R-Carrollton, picked up the idea.

Several co-signers and a Senate sponsor are expected to come forward before the General Assembly convenes Jan. 14.

The Virginia Farm Bureau has not taken an official position on Morris’ measure, but it opposed Cline’s effort last session. State officials have also testified against the idea, citing health concerns.

Christine Solem of Charlottesville says Virginia would be the first state to pass such a constitutional amendment.

“This is a fundamental right,” she told Watchdog in an interview. “It’s not a health issue — it’s a matter of personal liberty.”

Solem, who used to raise goats for goat milk, cites the example of raw milk, whose sale is prohibited in Virginia but allowed in 29 other states.

Only through “herd-sharing” contracts — in which a “share” of a dairy cow is purchased — can a person legally buy raw milk in Virginia.

Joel Salatin, owner of Polyface Farms in Swoope, Va., sees the constitutional amendment “as remediation for a centuries-old oversight to a fundamental human right that the framers of the original Bill of Rights could not have foreseen. They could not have imagined that a day would come when it would be illegal for someone to sell a glass of raw milk to a neighbor.”

“Similarly, they could not have foreseen a time when people would be largely denied the freedom to purchase foods of their choice — or at least make it so difficult it constitutes insurmountable hurdles. Inasmuch as this extends to all people, (the amendment) is inherently free from special interest.”

To become law, the amendment must pass two consecutive General Assemblies and be ratified by voters in a statewide referendum.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of the Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

]]>http://watchdog.org/187412/raw-milk-constitution/feed/0Bill aims to get inspectors out of home kitchenshttp://watchdog.org/188276/virginia-home-kitchens/
http://watchdog.org/188276/virginia-home-kitchens/#commentsFri, 26 Dec 2014 10:00:24 +0000http://watchdog.org/?p=188276

LIBERTY LOST: Bland County farmer Matthew French remembers when his grandfather sold home-slaughtered hogs across the state line into West Virginia. Today’s laws prevent farmers from engaging in such personal transactions.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

BLAND, Va. — Virginians who try to sell homemade food from their kitchens are feeling the heat from state and local inspectors.

“I have to turn down my neighbors when they ask if they can buy pesto I make from my own basil plants,” says Bernadette Barber, a farmer in Lancaster, Va.

And this isn’t just a rural phenomenon.

In Arlington, government inspectors shut down a home-based soup maker, even though no customer complaints had been registered. Others have encountered similar fates, stripping them of needed income.

Legislation served up for the 2015 General Assembly would turn the tables.

HB 1290, sponsored by Delegate Rob Bell, R-Charlottesville, would end home-kitchen inspections on items produced for direct sale. The goods would bear a label stating that the products are not for resale and were processed without state inspection.

“If someone wants to buy food from someone, what business is that of the state?” asks Matthew French, a farmer in Bland, Va. “The state basically comes at you with a gun, and says you can only buy from state-approved supplier.”

The push for fresh, locally made food is gaining ground,” French told Watchdog.org in an interview. “Buyers want to know the person who’s preparing their food. People want it — and the state is getting in the way,” he said.

The Virginia Food Freedom Act is a follow-up to a Bell-sponsored bill that failed during the 2014 session.

Bell’s original legislation was pilloried by cattlemen, pork growers, the Virginia Farm Bureau and a phalanx of government regulators. Critics claimed that farmers would be hanging cows on front-loaders on the side of the road, French recalls.

“It was ludicrous,” he said.

To address industry and government concerns, Bell’s new bill allows for continued inspection of beef and pork at all venues.

French figures the move will enhance the bill’s prospects for passage. “Politicians are afraid of not getting the Farm Bureau’s support,” he notes.

In the long run, French believes small-scale provisioning has an advantage over industrial-scale agriculture.

“Big business is making a huge mistake getting in bed with government. It doesn’t end well for them,” he said.

WE’LL DRINK TO THAT: With a $5 million check to Stone Brewing Co., Gov. Terry McAuliffe, right, helped bring high times to the Capitol last week.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — It’s easy to spend other people’s money.

Too often, government officials do just that with our tax dollars.

From funding beer to bailing out banks, here are the biggest wastes of taxpayer dollars in Virginia for 2014:

7. Funding elaborate bus stops and studies

After much public protest, Arlington County finally decided to find a way to lower the price of each of its elaborate bus stops from the original $1 million.

County officials couldn’t figure out how to do it, so the county spent $250,000 for a consulting group to study how to cut costs in half. The lower price —about half a million dollars — is still the median price of a house in the county.

6. Giving a $400,000 pension boost

The city of Richmond was already drowning in $2 billion of debt, but a top city official decided to improperly transfer one employee’s 800 hours of unused sick leave from her previous job so she could get $400,000 more in pension compensation.

Marshall restored the sick leave balance for Sharon Judkins, the city’s former chief administrative officer of finance and administration, so she could have a higher pension rate.

Makes you wonder what else goes on in the top echelons of government in the commonwealth’s capital.

Marshall resigned later in the year.

5. Bailing out a bank

What do you do when your county’s outstanding debt is more than $2.5 billion, school buildings are aging and public pension obligations are burdening the future?

Not bail out a bank that entered into a bad loan deal on a failing arts center, said Fairfax County Supervisor Pat Herrity.

He was the only supervisor to vote against the county’s move at the beginning of the year to take on a $30 million debt owed by what’s known as the Lorton Arts Center.

To make things worse, Herrity said, the loan wouldn’t even resolve the real issue — making the arts center sustainable.

4. Giving grants that disappear

As Watchdog.org reported earlier this year, more than $5.2 million in “tobacco” grants to Virginia communities disappeared from July 2007 to October 2014.

In that time, 22 localities defaulted on grants from the Tobacco Region Opportunity Fund or owe the Virginia Indemnification and Community Revitalization Commission money.

The way it works, the authorities give grants to localities. The localities give the grants to businesses that are supposed to create jobs. But if the businesses fail to come through and default, the localities must pick up the tab.

That has left some of the commonwealth’s poorest places, such as Danville, down and out.

3. Supplying Alpaca poop

Sometimes government waste gets a bit too literal.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave Virginia Mary’s Alpaca LLC a $50,000 grant to process, package and market alpaca manure as plant fertilizer, according to U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn’s 2014 Wastebook. The company, based in The Plains, boasts it makes the “perfect poops,” Coburn’s book notes. One Poop Pak of 20 costs $29.95.

With spending sprees like that, it’s little wonder Gallup found Americans think the federal government wastes 51 cents on every dollar, the highest figure since Gallup began asking the question in 1979.

2. Subsidizing beer

Gov. Terry McAuliffe, like governors before him, will do just about anything to attract business to the commonwealth — even if that means dropping $5 million from his Governor’s Opportunity Fund on beer. McAuliffe plopped the dough to attract Stone Brewing Co. to Richmond, to the protest of other businesses that never got a government subsidy

But he isn’t the only one willing to spend taxpayer dollars for the beer company. Richmond city taxpayers are picking up most of the $36 million tab for the brewery through bonds.

1. Subsidizing Hollywood (more)

At a time when the state faces a potential $2 billion shortfall, Virginia lawmakers voted to give even bigger tax subsidies to Hollywood. The Governor’s Opportunity Fund already allows the governor to give $2 million a year to virtually any film production he pleases. Still, state lawmakers decided to increase the cap for refundable corporate tax credits from $5 million every two years to $6.5 million every fiscal year.

Some experts and critics say subsidizing the film industry lets politicians pick winners and losers, distorting the free market system. They argue such credits cause funding losses in such areas as education, forcing taxpayers to make up the revenue elsewhere.

Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

Though the state’s official unemployment rate inched down from 5.1 percent to 5.0 percent, the number of working Virginians dropped from a high of 4,336,402 in May to 4,256,334 last month – a 1.8 percent dip.

“One explanation for the decline in labor-force participation is that as Baby Boomers age, more Americans are in retirement,” suggested the Center for American Progress.

“But the fact that we see the same trend among 25- to 54-year-olds, people in their prime working years, makes this theory hard to support,” said Michael Madowitz and Jackie Odum, researchers at the “progressive” center.

Madowitz and Odum say, “Policymakers and pundits have taken far too much comfort in the decline in the ‘headline unemployment rate.’”

News accounts and government press releases typically ignore or downplay the growing cohort of working-age adults who have quit looking for work. Not counting those individuals artificially lowers the unemployment rate.

Then there are the taxpayer costs.

The McAuliffe administration has spent millions of public dollars to lure new business. The Virginia Economic Development Partnership says it disbursed $37.77 million to 34 companies in 2014.

After less than 10 months in office, McAuliffe told the Washington Post he’d burned through $68 million, and needs a refill.

Other state and local programs hand out millions more. Some, including the Major Employment and Investment program, require General Assembly approval.

Though Democratic and Republican governors have issued tax incentives, grants and loans in an effort to attract business, McAuliffe says he’s getting the biggest bang for the buck. The Democrat says his administration has pledges of $5.17 billion in capital investment from new and expanding companies.

“That’s more than twice the amount brought to the commonwealth in any governor’s first 11 months in office,” McAuliffe’s office stated.

While much of the public money is spent upfront, the jobs are downstream. Many of the promised new positions are years away – and aren’t guaranteed to Virginians.

When Shandong Tranlin announced plans to build a paper and fertilizer plant on the James River in Chesterfield County, the Chinese conglomerate said it would not fulfill its hiring target until 2020.

Mike Thompson, president of the Thomas Jefferson Institute, a Springfield, Va.-based policy center, said, “As the General Assembly prepares to meet the challenge of closing the current budget deficit, it is critical for our elected leaders to grasp the true jobs picture.

“With 80,000 fewer jobs than just a few months ago, government policies must change if this spiral is to be reversed. Tax restructuring, combined with reforming government functions, are critical to true job creation and government efficiency,” Thompson said.

Kenric Ward is a national correspondent for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at kenric@watchdogvirginia.org or at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

POOR PRACTICES: A new state audit found that the University of Virginia needs to tighten up the ship a bit.

By Kathryn Watson | Watchdog.org, Virginia Bureau

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — As if the University of Virginia didn’t have the negative spotlight, a new audit finds Thomas Jefferson’s institution isn’t keeping tight reins on all of its money and property.

The Charlottesville university improperly awarded no-bid contracts, eliminated competitive bids by separating purchases, nixed $72,0000 worth of forklifts from its asset records, and added a $250 fee for business students without approval from the governing Board of Visitors.

Other reports have called into question the school’s process of informally handling suspected rape cases.

The most recent audit reveals not only sloppy fiscal reporting, but also the possibility that university employees intentionally cut corners on state competitive procurement practices — practices in place to ensure public agencies get the most bang for their bucks.

Auditors tested all purchases where the same department made two or more purchases on the same day from the same vendor. They found university employees were possibly splitting up purchases to make sure the individual totals fell below the $5,000 threshold for competitive bids.

“For four of these incidences, the university provided no justification. For five incidences, the justifications were unreasonable and may indicate intentional splitting to avoid the delays and additional work caused by competitive procurements,” the audit found.

In its written response, the university insisted is isn’t trying to undervalue or split purchases, saying those in charge of purchases followed the rules.

In another sweeping finding, the audit reported UVA awarded no-bid contracts — allowed when only one vendor is available for a product or service — when the school should have sought competitive bids.

In the facilities management department’s no-bid contracts auditors analyzed, the university not only used “inadequate” justifications for not seeking bids, it didn’t post the award notices publicly as required by law.

On top of that, the UVA Medical Center eliminated four forklifts worth $72,000 total from its inventory, saying it handed them over to the academic side of the university. But when auditors checked with academic officers, nobody had the forklifts. When the auditors returned to the Medical Center, they eventually found the forklifts still in use.

Missing equipment seems to be a major problem at Virginia’s universities and state agencies.

A Watchdog.org investigation found that from 2009 to 2012, state agencies reported a total of $8 million in missing equipment. And at Virginia State University, another state audit alleged a former faculty member was responsible for the disappearance of a $186,222 microscope.

UVA also paid for an outside insurance broker to get insurance bids for UVA athletes at its Wise, Virginia, campus instead of using the university’s in-house procurement team, according to the audit.

The audit also found the university didn’t get approval from its governing Board of Visitors in 2012 when it started slapping a $250 fee on all students enrolling in its Darden School of Business. The fee is nothing new for business students. But since the school was having a tough time actually collecting it, UVA rolled it into students’ overall tuition and fees bill.

“Despite receiving approval by upper management, we recommend that this fee be approved by the Board in accordance with the Code of Virginia…” the audit says.

University officials also failed to update payroll information into a new accounting system for pension reporting. State agencies now, for the first time, must list overall pension liabilities in financial statements for the first time.

Given how large UVA is, that matters to the bottom line of the entire state.

UVA spokespeople pointed to the university’s official responses in the audit, where university officials said they either fixed or are fixing the inconsistencies.

“Furthermore, at the November Board of Visitors’ meeting, the APA reported that it found that the university’s financial statements are presented fairly in all material respects; there are no internal control findings classified as material weaknesses, and no instances of noncompliance or other matters required to be reported under Government Accounting Standards,” said Anthony P. de Bruyn, a university spokesperson.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

EYES ON YOU: Virginia is notorious for cracking down on speeders — and state police are proud of it.

By Kenric Ward | Watchdog.org Virginia Bureau

RICHMOND, Va. — In a hurry this holiday? Beware that Virginia ranks as one of the toughest states on speeders, and police are proud of it.

Driving 20 mph over the speed limit classifies as reckless driving in Virginia law. That offense is not a mere traffic citation, but a Class One criminal misdemeanor punishable by a $2,500 fine and up to a year in jail.

“It’s the highest level misdemeanor, right below a felony,” said Michael Frank, who rated states as best and worst for speeders.

Virginia came in at fourth toughest, with New Jersey finishing No. 1. With its wide-open highways, North Dakota was ranked most lenient.

Unlike North Dakota, which imposes a modest $5 fine for each mile per hour over the 65-mph speed limit, Virginia pulls out all the stops to crack down on speeders.

“Congestion, coupled with speed traps, red-light cameras and aggressive traffic enforcement make Virginia a very difficult place to drive,” said John Bowman, spokesman for the National Motorists Association.

“When the commonwealth raised its interstate speed limits a few years back, it failed to adjust the reckless driving threshold accordingly. So now, anyone caught going 11 mph over the posted speed on the interstate is subject to a reckless driving charge,” Bowman told Watchdog.org.

Notorious for running radar traps along the I-95 corridor, Virginia is among the 10 states with the lowest highway death rate per 100 million miles traveled.

“If such a reputation gets drivers to comply with speed limits, buckle up, and not drive distracted, impaired or aggressively on Virginia’s highways, then it’s a reputation we can live with,” Geller said.

Geller also pointed out that all funds generated from summonses issued by Virginia State Police “go directly to court fees and the state’s Literary Fund, which benefits public school construction, technology funding and teacher retirement.”

Patrick George wasn’t feeling particularly philanthropic when police nailed him for doing 93 mph in a 55-mph zone in Rappahannock County.

After he was nabbed in his Camaro ZL1, George said, “The best plea deal I got was a fine of about $400 with court costs, a 10-day suspension of my license in Virginia and three days in jail. The judge has an option of giving one day in jail for every mile an hour over 90 mph, and he would exercise it.”

Though Virginia is the 12th largest state in population, it ranks seventh for most tickets issued per year. And while the I-95 corridor in Northern Virginia and the Hampton Roads region are chronically congested, the state has wide-open spaces, too. Fun fact: Southwest Virginia extends west of Detroit.

“Speed limits are set absurdly low, 45 mph on some highways,” said Frank. “Radar detectors are illegal, and cops have devices to detect them.”

Bowman said his group’s research shows that Virginia has far more traffic attorneys per capita — about 18 per 100,000 residents.

“That’s nearly twice as high as the next state, which is Maryland,” Bowman said. “This indicates an extraordinarily high level of traffic enforcement, otherwise there wouldn’t be enough demand to keep all of those lawyers in business.”

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward

Minnesota: The Democratic stronghold “bowed to economic reality,” said Jonathan Williams, director of ALEC’s Center for State Fiscal Reform. The cuts in corporate taxes, however, will be largely offset by $2.1 billion in tax increases enacted in 2013.

New York: The Empire State increased its death-tax exemption and lowered its corporate tax rate.

Maryland: After raising taxes and fees 100 times under Democratic Gov. Martin O’Malley, the state increased the exemption on its death tax, nearing the federal rate.

Rhode island: The state cut corporate taxes, while broadening them. It also raised the death-tax exemption, but hiked other fees. ALEC called Rhode Island’s actions a “close call.”

By comparison, Wisconsin, under Republican Gov. Scott Walker, slashed some $800 million in taxes, making the Badger State No. 1 on ALEC’s scorecard.

McAuliffe, who made Medicaid expansion one of his biggest campaign platforms when he ran for office in 2013, said he isn’t giving up, even though state lawmakers flat-out rejected his proposals for expansion this year.

“Closing the coverage gap is the right thing to do for our budget, our economy and the families we all serve,” McAuliffe said in prepared remarks. “Our economic competitor states are accepting this funding.”

Republicans, however, vow to stop that from happening.

“The House of Delegates has overwhelmingly rejected Medicaid expansion three times and it would be irresponsible to try and again use the budget as leverage on this issue,” said Speaker of the House Bill Howell in a statement. “We hope this is not the governor’s intent.”

“Bringing Richmond the same divisive tactics that have resulted in paralysis in Washington, Governor McAuliffe is clearly more focused on raw politics than responsible policy,” Norment said in a statement. “It appears to me that the intended audience for his recent pronouncements is not the people of Virginia, but Michael Bloomberg, Tom Steyer, and Cecile Richards.”

The commonwealth’s funding gap is projected at $2 billion, as the original biennial budget for 2014-2016 planned for much more spending than Virginia seems to be collecting in revenue.

McAuliffe claims expanding Medicaid in January 2016 will save the commonwealth $105 million in the first six months alone, and says Virginia has already “forfeited” $154 million in the past year by not expanding the government-funded health care program.

McAuliffe and other state leaders have already addressed some of the money concerns by dipping into the state’s rainy day fund and cutting some agency expenses. Now, McAuliffe is proposing to limit some tax preferences.

It’s a targeted approach the Democratic governor announced Wednesday, specifically limiting tax credits electric utilities and coal companies take for production and employment, that property owners take for land preservation and that people can take for purchasing long-term care insurance.

It’s the cuts to energy tax preferences that have U.S. Rep. Morgan Griffith, a Republican from coal-rich Southwest Virginia, criticizing the governor.

“I have one message for those waging the war on coal: end the war on coal so that the people in coal-producing regions of Southwest Virginia can better support their own local governments, schools, and their own families,” Griffith said in a statement.

A study by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission, the watchdog arm of the General Assembly, found in 2011 the commonwealth gave up more than $12 billion in tax revenue through preferences in 2008 alone.

— Kathryn Watson is an investigative reporter for Watchdog.org’s Virginia Bureau, and can be found on Twitter @kathrynw5.

House Speaker Bill Howell, R-Falmouth, is facing a primary challenge from former Stafford County Supervisor Susan Stimpson, who accuses GOP leaders of favoring corporate partnerships at taxpayer expense.

“The General Assembly’s public-private partnership deals, have developed a pattern of negotiating most of the financial risk on Virginia taxpayers,” Stimpson said of recent road projects.

“The new HOT (high-occupany toll) lanes are an example of this. If the tolls do not reach the agreed upon revenue levels, then the taxpayers must kick in tax dollars to offset that shortfall.”

Stimpson cited the much-maligned and unbuilt section of Route 460 that was to link Suffolk and Petersburg. Critics called the aborted public-private venture a road to nowhere.

“Virginia has spent $300 million without turning over one piece of dirt. Governor (Terry) McAuliffe immediately nixed the project once he came into office, and It is estimated that it could cost up to $900 million just to cancel it,” Stimpson told Watchdog.org.

“Virginians have received nothing for this boondoggle and we still sit in traffic.”

Howell counters that public-private partnerships are “an integral part of Virginia’s efforts to build a 21st-century transportation network.”

REFORM: House Speaker Bill Howell says he expects the public-private partnership process to be debated at the 2015 General Assembly.

“When administered effectively, they reduce taxpayer risk and leverage the positives of the private sector to benefit transportation users,” the 26-year lawmaker said. “The I-495 and I-95 express lanes are two great examples of successful P3 projects. The I-95 express lanes are opening one month ahead of schedule.”

“P3s have enabled Virginia to build key infrastructure years sooner than would otherwise be the case due to federal and state governments failure to provide adequate funding,” Chase said.

Yet he cautioned, “P3s are not the answer to every infrastructure need, nor are toll roads in general. But in select instances, they do make a difference in terms of improving mobility, accessibility and prosperity.”

While supporting reform of the P3 model, McAuliffe declared last week: “Without the ability to partner with the private sector and leverage their capital and resources, Express Lanes would not have been built.”

Howell acknowledged, “There are steps we can take to improve transparency and increase accountability in the P3 process. I expect those to be debated during the 2015 General Assembly session.”

“It will prevent (Route) 460 from happening again, and it will prevent the situation we have at the Midtown-Downtown,” Jones said, referring to the 58-year toll deal on the river crossings between Portsmouth and Norfolk.

Stimpson, who ran for the GOP nomination for lieutenant governor in 2013, is watching Richmond with a skeptical eye.

“I see less and less transparency in the (legislative) process and more evidence of deals cut outside of the light of day. It is time to take a closer look at these public private ‘deals’ that the General Assembly is negotiating,” she said.

Robert Sarvis, the Virginia Libertarian Party’s candidate for governor and U.S. Senate in the past two elections, said, “More oversight is good, but a decisive move toward ‘user-pays’ would develop infrastructure that would attract much greater interest from private investors, meaning more competition and better services to the public.”

From a political perspective, Sarvis added, “We ought to be concerned that ‘oversight’ can too easily be converted into cronyist regulatory regimes that accidentally or intentionally privilege incumbent or preferred companies, giving them essentially sweetheart deals.”

At least one contractor admits the P3 model isn’t the bargain that politicians claim.

Lane Construction, which has expressed interest in building toll lanes on Interstate 66, said the need for equity investors to turn a profit builds in higher costs. Add the attendant legal fees, financial advisory fees, consultant fees and rating agency expenses, and the public gets a more expensive project than advertised.

Kenric Ward is a national reporter for Watchdog.org and chief of its Virginia Bureau. Contact him at (571) 319-9824. @Kenricward